Expert Urges FG to Digitalise Health Sector

A digital public health expert, Zaid Olanrewaju, has urged the Federal Government to digitalise the country’s health sector to improve healthcare service delivery in the country.

Olanrewaju made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on the sidelines of a stakeholders’ meeting on Friday in Abuja.

He emphasised the need for the government to create a national digital health blueprint which would facilitate digital integration of health information and health providers in the country.

This, according to him, will set the development of health technology in the country.

“It will also facilitate digital integration of health information of all patients and health providers, as well as an integrated development of digital health infrastructure and architecture, thereby establishing a solid framework for the one health approach to unlock Nigeria’s healthcare value chain.

“This multitier digital health transformation will incorporate two programmes that will integrate data and build an innovation ecosystem for the nation by creating a national health database.”

Olanrewaju further said that the blueprint would help the government achieve its goal to provide affordable and quality healthcare to Nigerians.

Similarly, the expert said the blueprint would help the government enroll nearly 50 million Nigerians into the health insurance scheme.

“Digitalization of the Nigeria health sector will increase efficiency by 15 per cent while increasing the value to US$18 billion.

“The digital health blueprint also will accelerate Nigeria’s e-health efforts on national solutions in the form of electronic health records (EHRs).

“And clinical workflow management systems that will guarantee evidence based patient centered care, secure data for national research and planning,” he said.