According to the Ministry of Health (MOH), 2024 marks a significant milestone in officially implementing the Minister's decision to set standards and format for output data used in the appraisal and payment of medical service costs covered by health insurance.
These new data standards have replaced the old ones implemented since 2017, which "no longer suited robust digital transformation tasks in modern times," according to MOH.
The ministry tested these standards for over a year, and officially implemented om July 1. After more than five months, 12,485 healthcare facilities nationwide could connect and relay medical examination and treatment data with social insurance agency, with over 81 million records set in accordance with the new data standards.
A representative from the Health Insurance Department said the ministry has piloted the integration of health insurance referral forms and follow-up appointment slips on the National Electronic Identification app VNeID managed by the Ministry of Public Security (MPS), as part of Government Project 06.
Annually, medical facilities conduct 170 million outpatient examinations and treat 17 million patients. According to Vietnam Social Insurance, more than 1.5 million health insurance referrals and about 5 million electronic follow-up slips have been submitted to the social insurance data portal. Of these, 600,000 referrals and approximately 2.1 million follow-up slips have been synchronized into the National Population Data Center—C06 of MPS, for display on the VNeID app.
MOH affirmed that electronic health insurance referrals and follow-up appointment slips have promoted transparency in the referral process, simplified administrative procedures, and streamlined referrals and follow-ups. This initiative also curtails fraud and forgery.
EMR still running slowly
EMR is considered the starting point and the core of digital transformation in the healthcare sector. The latest statistics from MOH indicate that as of October 2024, Vietnam had 1,645 hospitals, including 384 private ones.
On average, each provincial hospital needs to invest over VND10 billion to implement EMR. Larger hospitals like Bach Mai and Viet Duc Friendship Hospitals in Hanoi need much bigger investments.
According to MOH’s Circular 46/2018, all grade-1 hospitals had to implement EMR by the end of 2023. However, only over 100 hospitals have declared the use of such records to date, including over 30 grade-1 hospitals, while the others are provincial and district hospitals.
Phu Tho and Quang Ninh are the two localities with the highest numbers of hospitals and medical centers using EMR.
"The figure is not up to expectations," MOH stated in a workshop to finalize the draft circular guiding the implementation of EMR in October.
There are 34 central hospitals under the MOH’s direct control, serving as end-line hospitals and mostly grade-1 or higher. However, very few have announced the full use of EMRs to replace paper records.
Most recently, on December 19, the National Dermatology Hospital under MOH became the first hospital in the dermatology field nationwide recognized as meeting requirements to deploy EMR.
MOH now has five special hospitals (Bach Mai, Viet Duc Friendship Hospital, Cho Ray, Thai Nguyen Central Hospital and Hue Central Hospital). But Bach Mai remains the only hospital which can employ EMR since November 1, 2024.
Dao Xuan Co, director of Bach Mai Hospital, said at a conference discussing the implementation of the tasks in 2025, affirmed that the hospital is determined to pursue the ‘Digital Transformation Literacy Campaign’.
Speaking at the official launch of the EMR system at Bach Mai Hospital on November 1, 2024 MOH Minister Dao Hong Lan said that if the country's largest general hospital successfully implements EMR, other medical facilities and localities can certainly do so.
Virtual assistants to public servants
In addition to completing the legal framework for developing IT applications in healthcare, MOH will also focus on advancing digital transformation, with focus on non-cash payment methods, EMR, interoperable lab results and the deployment of the Electronic Health Book on VNeID.
Another focus is robustly implementing the Government’s Project 06 on facilitating digital transformation, and applying digital technologies in most healthcare activities and services to form a smart healthcare system, with three parts - smart disease prevention, smart diagnosis and treatment, and smart healthcare management.
MOH also aims to enhance the quality of online public service delivery, ensuring citizen and business identification and authentication for seamless and integrated online services across all MOH platforms.
Vo Thu