On April 18, 2023, the Data Exchange Between Healthcare Providers (Wegiz) Bill was unanimously passed by the Senate. With the Wegiz, the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport aims to simplify data exchange between healthcare providers, via standardized electronic means. This will give healthcare providers faster and easier access to the necessary (medical) data of their patients, which will increase the quality of care and reduce the time spent on administrative actions.
The Wegiz is a framework law regulating general principles, responsibilities and procedures and allows for future, more detailed rules to be established for the exchange of data between health care providers. The Wegiz only addresses how data should be exchanged, not whether data may be exchanged.
Data sharing between health care providers is essential to being able to provide quality care. However, the manner in which this exchange was to take place was unregulated prior to Wegiz. While some care domains and regions were already using fully digitized data exchange, other care domains and regions were still using fax, DVD or paper. This resulted in fragmentation in the infrastructure (and thus: suboptimal cooperation). The legislator therefore deemed it necessary to establish rules for a single standardized electronic infrastructure for healthcare at the national level.
The Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport, together with the Healthcare Information Council, has developed a "Wegiz Multi-Year Agenda," which lists the data exchanges that are suitable for electronic processing. The Wegiz Multi-Year Agenda is updated periodically. Currently, there are 12 types of data exchanges that need to be digitized, with five types of data exchanges taking priority, namely:
transmission of basic data (basic patient information),
Exchange of image and report (MRI scans or heart scans),
nursing transfer (information for nursing homes and hospitals),
medication transfer (digital prescribing of medication) and
acute care transfer.
The Wegiz stipulates that healthcare providers must use a certified ICT system for electronic data exchanges to take place. This aims to ensure that the same language and technology is used by ICT systems, resulting in a quality standard that is unambiguous and clear for every healthcare provider and that has a positive effect on market forces. Moreover, each type of data exchange will have its own NEN standards. The Netherlands Standardization Institute (NEN Standards) is the institute that will develop these standards and certification schemes together with the healthcare field.
From when can healthcare providers expect change?
The Wegiz will take effect July 1, 2023. Since it is a framework law, additional, more specific rules for each type of data exchange will follow later. When the exchange of the types of data mentioned in the Multiyear Plan Wegiz may only take place electronically is therefore still unclear. It is expected that this will not be before January 1, 2024. What is clear is that the prioritized types of data exchange (medication transfer, basic data, nurse transfer, image availability and acute care) are first on the agenda.
In any case, healthcare providers would do well to make the necessary preparations now, so that soon Wegiz can be gradually implemented in the processes for electronic exchange of patient data.
https://www.eerstekamer.nl/behandeling/20220927/gewijzigd_voorstel_van_wet_2
