Globe Telecom’s corporate arm Globe Business officially launched on Thursday, Nov. 13, its Web-based solution meant to advance healthcare delivery in the Philippines.
The on-demand offering, dubbed HealthCloud, was announced during the first day of Digital Life Congress and Expo held at the World Trade Center in Makati City.
HealthCloud is an end-to-end solution that promises to provide real-time and secure access to health information within the healthcare ecosystem.
According to Globe vice president for IT-enabled services product group Francisco Claravall, the technology aims to solve the numerous pain points in carrying out healthcare processes, especially for patients.
“During a simple consultation, starting from paperwork at the level of the health maintenance organization until the dispensing of doctors’ prescriptions and all the required approvals in between, the methods could be time-consuming and tedious for the sick individual, to say the least,” Claravall said.
Besides patient care, Claravall said Globe HealthCloud is expected to increase work efficiencies of doctors and HMOs concerning scheduling, approving, record keeping, and facilitating claims, among others.
Among its core basic elements include a healthcare providers’ directory with listing of healthcare providers across the Philippines; online appointment booking from patients to doctors; electronic messaging between patients, doctors and HMOs via chat or email; and patient health record containing a collection of healthcare recipients’ information.
The solution is divided into three major applications: HealthCloud HMO, HealthCloud MD, and HealthCloud Patient.
The HealthCloud HMO is a system developed to improve HMO processes with online scheduling and claims handling. The cloud-based solution automates communication and transaction between the HMO and other healthcare stakeholders like patients, doctors and diagnostic clinics.
Meanwhile, the HealthCloud MD is a digital representation of medical files specific to a physician, practice, or organization. By replacing paper processes with its automated cloud-based solution, doctors can increase clinical efficiencies and provide better patient care.
As for the HealthCloud Patient, it is an electronic health information system that helps organize and store personal health records. The system allows secure sharing of information to healthcare providers, ensuring immediate proper treatment, as well as a more personalized level care.
“This Web-based solution would have less control of information than most people think,” said Globe chief operating officer for business and international markets and chief strategy officer Gil Genio. “Actually, it is more secure than bits and pieces of paper lying around.”
Genio said HealthCloud is hosted in Globe’s data center, and is secure against intrusion.
He added the HealthCloud application itself uses encryption, which converts data to garbled messages “unintelligible to interceptors”, allowing safe transmission of records over the Internet.