During a recent mission in Romania experts from WHO/Europe launched the first stage of a multiyear partnership aimed at transforming and improving digital health services in the country. The digital health partnership builds on a new memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in June by WHO/Europe and the Romanian Ministry of Health (MoH) to provide concrete support as part of the country’s recovery and resilience plan (RRP).
“It was a pleasure to meet with the data and digital health experts from the WHO Regional Office for Europe coming to Romania to provide technical assistance for the RRP,” said Dr Adriana Pistol, Secretary of State at the MoH of Romania. “This project is an excellent opportunity to advance the digitalization of the health system in our country to improve our health information system and increase the quality and availability of data.”
With the new MoU, WHO has committed to helping Romania build capacity for managing public health funds and human resources in health and develop a secure e-health and telemedicine system.
”The data and digital health project will support the Romanian health system to better use data to support policy-making, and thus enable a better and more responsible decision-making process,” Dr Pistol added. “WHO’s technical assistance will help to reduce the burden of bureaucracy and contribute to better quality of care for the people of Romania.”
“As partners of the MoH in the health component of the RRP, we are committed to bringing in our expertise and top experts to make the best use of this opportunity for health reform in Romania, with a focus on digital health, human resources in health, and quality management in health services,” added Dr Cassandra Butu, Acting Head of WHO’s Country Office in Romania.
Assessing Romania’s health information systems
During the mission, WHO experts conducted a comprehensive assessment of Romania’s health information systems (HISs) using WHO’s Support tool to assess health information systems and develop and strengthen health information strategies. HISs provide valuable data and information that can be used to guide decision-making at all levels of the health system.
The Romanian health system still requires extensive investment and support to become efficient in its use of data for health. In November 2019 the European Commission published the State of Health in the EU: Romania – Country Health Profile 2019, in collaboration with the OECD and the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies.
The document highlights some of the challenges in Romania’s health system, such as limited information about quality of care and inaccuracy of patient safety indicators.
While focusing on these findings, the WHO mission also identified strong political commitment from the MoH to bring about health reforms that will foster a culture of data use for evidence-based decision-making and improved performance.
The outcomes of this assessment will support Romanian authorities in developing better national HISs.
Next steps
This first step in this multiyear collaboration is establishing the building blocks for the Government of Romania to achieve long-lasting, sustainable change. Local, practical solutions, coupled with ongoing policy dialogue, will go a long way in developing a robust and sustainable digital health system in Romania.