SESSIONS » II.c eHEALTH FOR SOCIETY / The challenges for interoperability for cross border care

In the last decades, the ubiquitous deployment of personal computers and the generalized access to communication networks has mostly highlighted the widespread prevalence of incompatible hardware, software and data. Technical incompatibility between system has often been claimed to be the last obstacle to interoperability. In reality several aspects of true interoperability have been overlooked, their significance for the quality of health information undervalued, their relevance in societal terms underestimated, and the resources required to address the issue, though very sizeable, grossly minimized to entice eager adopters to futures rather than actual solutions.

To empower all stakeholders in the health field, including health professionals and citizen patients with equal rights in a multilingual and multicultural territory born of different histories and political experiences, semantic interoperability has emerged as an approach of choice to cross borders. Not only geographically, but also between scientific disciplines or jurisdictions with different levels of development, resources and responsibility. Building on the previous undeniable achievements of technical interoperability, semantic interoperability will be fit for the XXIst century. The roadmap to that destination exists. It does not promise quick fixes to existing patchworks. It calls on mobilizing creativity, imagination and resources for R&D and deployment beyond the capacity and the forces of any single actor alone. WHO, as a catalyst for international cooperation will do its share in promoting collaborative work through networks of excellence. It will be guided by its Member States, confident that their strong political will and the mobilization of resources commensurate with the task will make a difference.

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