Enhancing Connected Care through Public-Private Partnerships: The Patient Summary

I have always been a strong advocate for digital health and the transformative potential of public-private partnerships in tackling some of Canada’s most pressing healthcare challenges. From clinician burnout due to administrative burden to excessive wait times ?and barriers to healthcare access, enhancing connectivity throughout our healthcare system is vital. Ensuring all Canadians receive high-quality healthcare and that no patient falls through the cracks — regardless of their location — is our priority.

Advancing Connected Care and Interoperability

Infoway is making great progress in advancing healthcare interoperability across Canada through various initiatives. Our Shared pan-Canadian Interoperability Roadmap aims to create a cohesive and efficient healthcare system that prioritizes the needs of both patients and providers. Now in action, the Roadmap has set the stage for some incredibly important initiatives across Canada, including:

• Working Together Bilateral Health Agreements : Signed in March between the federal government and the provinces and territories, these agreements allocate significant funding to advancing key connected care initiatives.
• Bill C-72 (Connected Care for Canadians Act) : This recently introduced legislation outlines Canada’s plan for a connected healthcare system, enabling secure access to patient health data between providers and patients.

Case Study: The Patient Summary

One key initiative in the pursuit of a more connected Canadian healthcare system is the Patient Summary . This standardized summary offers clinicians consistent and up-to-date information from patient health records, which includes essential details such as illness history, medications, allergies, immunizations, and procedure history. In the Canadian context, the Patient Summary is designed to ensure that this critical health information is accessible and reliable across different provinces and territories, addressing the unique challenges of Canada's diverse and geographically dispersed healthcare system. By securely sharing this information across healthcare information systems, the Patient Summary facilitates seamless care transitions, reduces the risk of medical errors, and enhances the continuity of care. This means that whether a patient is visiting a local clinic, a specialist in another province, or is being treated in an emergency situation, their vital health information is readily available to healthcare providers, ensuring timely and informed decision-making for improved patient outcomes.

The Pan-Canadian Patient Summary Specification (PS-CA)

Infoway is spearheading the advancement of the pan-Canadian Patient Summary Specification (PS-CA), a comprehensive framework developed to standardize the terminology and data used by information systems across Canada's diverse healthcare landscape. This specification ensures that crucial health information within the Patient Summary can be shared and received accurately, safely and consistently across different healthcare systems, between healthcare providers, and to patients.

For clinicians, the PS-CA means having access to up-to-date patient information, regardless of where the patient has previously received care. This accessibility is vital for making informed clinical decisions, lightening the administrative burden, reducing the risk of medical errors, and ensuring continuity of care. For Canadians, the PS-CA translates into a more cohesive, patient-centred healthcare experience. Patients can move between provinces or visit new healthcare providers without the need to repeatedly transfer medical records or recount their medical history.

The PS-CA cannot be successfully developed and implemented across Canada without the partnership of both the private and public sectors, as each brings unique strengths to the advancement of data exchange and Patient Summary adoption. Private sector partners continue to drive technological innovation, agility, and expertise in developing and deploying digital health solutions, ensuring both accessibility and functionality. Public sector partners provide regulatory oversight, broad reach, and a deep understanding of the healthcare landscape, aligning the Patient Summary with local health infrastructure and ensuring equitable and secure solutions.

Together, these partnerships create a collaborative environment that fosters the development of innovative, interoperable health solutions, ensuring patient data is shared accurately and safely across the healthcare continuum. The collaboration between the private and public sectors in data sharing and advancing connected care continues to yield substantial benefits. However, Canada’s healthcare ecosystem still needs to undergo transformation to fully capitalize on this partnership.

Collaborative Efforts to Transform Healthcare Delivery

To address barriers to private-public collaboration, Infoway is actively working with stakeholders from both public and private sectors, including various provinces, territories and vendors, to strengthen the ecosystem in which we operate and enhance the partnerships that drive our initiatives forward.

Industry Collaborative

Infoway's Industry Collaborative is a dynamic initiative designed to foster meaningful partnerships between the public and private sectors within the digital health landscape. By bringing together diverse stakeholders, including healthcare providers, IT vendors, policymakers, and industry leaders, the Collaborative aims to accelerate the development and adoption of innovative health solutions. This forum facilitates open dialogue, knowledge sharing, and joint problem-solving, ensuring that all participants can contribute to and benefit from advancements in connected care.

Currently at 34 private sector and vendor partners, Infoway held its most recent Industry Collaborative meeting during the 2024 eHealth conference on May 28 in Vancouver, BC. Through the Industry Collaborative, Infoway and our partners remain committed to building a more integrated, efficient, and patient-centered healthcare system in Canada.

Early Implementer Program

We recently celebrated a major achievement in advancing Connected Care through Infoway’s Vendor Early Implementation Program, in partnership with Microquest and the Government of Alberta. This program supports the Shared pan-Canadian Interoperability Roadmap — focusing on the Patient Summary Initiative via the PS-CA specification — accelerating the adoption of interoperable digital health solutions by allowing vendors to validate their systems against national standards.

Microquest, the first vendor to join the program, reached an important milestone by demonstrating that their system, "Healthquest EMR v4.4.50," achieved conformance for the PS-CA specification. This achievement paves the way for Microquest to now enter a tailored testing environment within Alberta’s healthcare infrastructure, to then eventual clinical adoption where vendor systems are actively used by Albertan clinics to submit Patient Summaries. This program highlights the kind of momentum and success achievable when stakeholders can collaborate in a cooperative and innovative environment.

Pan-Canadian Projectathons

In March 2023, Infoway hosted its second pan-Canadian Projectathon, an event aimed at testing and validating the interoperability of healthcare systems across Canada. The Projectathon brought together private sector partners, like Akinox Solutions , Microquest Inc., Oracle Health , TELUS Health | TELUS Santé , VeroSource, a HEALWELL AI Company , WELL Health Technologies Corp. (TSX: WELL) , and others. These vendors tested their systems' ability to securely exchange patient summaries using the pan-Canadian Patient Summary (PS-CA) and the Canadian FHIR Exchange (CA) specifications.

Key objectives of the Projectathon included:

• Interoperability Testing: Ensuring systems could securely exchange patient summaries.
• Collaboration and Learning: Fostering collaboration among vendors and stakeholders.
• Feedback and Improvement: Gathering insights to refine and improve interoperability specifications and tools.

The event was a success, with vendors demonstrating a high level of readiness to meet PS-CA standards. Looking ahead, Infoway will be hosting not only another pan-Canadian Projectathon, but we are also partnering with IHE International to hold the first ever Canadian-based IHE North America Connectathon Week . This inaugural Canadian event, taking place February 3-7, 2025, will bring together industry colleagues at one of the largest health IT interoperability technical testing events around the world, and will also accelerate pan-Canadian interoperability readiness at the Projectathon testing event.

Leveraging Partnerships to Advance Standards Adoption

Public-private partnerships play an integral role in driving innovation and efficiency in the healthcare sector, and Infoway’s initiatives demonstrate the potential of these collaborations to advance Connected Care across Canada. To further digital health innovation and standards adoption, it is crucial to leverage the specific strengths and roles of both private and public partners effectively.

This collaboration provides the necessary resources, technical support, and incentives to overcome implementation barriers. By engaging both public and private stakeholders early in the development process, offering pilot programs, and providing clear guidance and resources, we strive to support the successful adoption and integration of health information standards across the country. This approach also prioritizes patients, ensuring Canadians receive timely, effective care regardless of their location.

It’s evident: advancing connected care at the momentum our healthcare system requires will not be possible without the collaboration of both private and public partners. Aligning on common standards, adopting new technologies, and fostering a culture of continuous improvement are crucial. Robust public-private partnerships are an essential cornerstone to unlocking the full potential of Canada’s healthcare system, ultimately enhancing patient care and health outcomes nationwide.