Work on, concerned agency conducting safety audit: MS
Irfan Tramboo
Srinagar, May 9: While a number of healthcare facilities across J&K have already integrated with the Ayushman Bharat Digital Health Mission (ABDM), the premier healthcare institution of the Union Territory, SKIMS Soura, has failed to integrate its software with the ABDM, causing significant delays in furthering the reach of the Government’s flagship program aiming seamless healthcare service delivery.
Excelsior has learned that SKIMS should have ensured integration with the ABDM a year ago, but on the contrary, despite repeated reminders from the concerned department, little progress has been made, leading to a slow-paced implementation.
Due to the absence of integration between SKIMS software and the ABDM ecosystem, several facilities and a seamless digital experience for stakeholders cannot be provided.
For instance, the Electronic Medical Record (EMR) cannot be generated using the patient’s ABHA ID, and SKIMS will be unable to launch the Scan and Share facility, a key feature of ABDM already implemented in several hospitals across J&K including newly established GMC, Baramulla.
While other hospitals have successfully integrated with ABDM, SKIMS appears to be lagging behind and is currently conducting a security audit of its existing software, which should have been done much earlier.
On the matter, SKIMS authorities informed Excelsior that the integration process is underway, but they did not provide a timeline for its completion. They mentioned that the security audit of the existing system is being carried out by an agency selected through tendering.
Dr Farooq Jan, the Medical Superintendent of SKIMS, stated that without the security audit report, the integration process cannot proceed. “The agency conducting the security audit informed us approximately 15 days ago that it would be completed within 10-20 days,” he said, adding the latest status needs to be confirmed with them.
According to information available with the Excelsior, the Health & Medical Education (H&ME) Department has raised the issue with SKIMS authorities multiple times and several meetings, presided over by the Director of SKIMS, have been conducted in this regard.
“We were assured that the entire process will be completed soon after Eid; quite a time has passed since then, but there has not been any development; I don’t know why there has not been any follow-up in this regard so far,” Dr Shafqat Khan, Additional Mission Director ABDM, J&K told the Excelsior.
It is important to note that the ABDM aims to establish an integrated digital health infrastructure by creating digital highways while its objective is to bridge the gap among diverse stakeholders in the healthcare ecosystem and foster collaboration and connectivity by integrating software used by both private and public hospitals through the ABDM Sandbox.
The officials said that the implementation of the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission (ABDM) works towards transforming health service delivery by enhancing efficiency, transparency, and patient empowerment through secure medical record access, teleconsultation, e-pharmacy, and improved information on healthcare facilities and providers.
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