In a connection with the last day for pharmacies to accept the format of the photo-medical prescription, this week the regulation of the Electronic Prescription Law will finally come out, Health Minister Carla Vizzotti confirmed this Monday, in a meeting with journalists in which he clarified that, in principle, a national system for the preparation of digital prescriptions will not be launched, but that the applications that already exist (close to 50) must be registered and go through a process of "monitoring".
Both the free or paid apps that many health professionals informally downloaded to their cell phones in recent years, as well as the platforms with which prepaid doctors and obras sociales have been issuing electronic prescriptions, must register before the end of December 2023. in a ministerial register.
There they will fill out a form that will ask them to provide various technical details.
Then, as part of a process that they defined as "progressive", by
March 2024
the Ministry should have determined which platforms have the official "ok" to function.
The control will be in charge of the jurisdictions.
The screening will start from a combo of standards to be defined, which will be based on the regulatory framework that gives context to the Digital Prescriptions law.
According to Vizzotti, among the most important of this body we must mention the Law of Prescription by Generic Name (of 2002), the Law of Patient Rights (of 2009) and the Law of Protection of Personal Data (of 2000), regulations that, reported Clarín a few days ago, it suffers from an update according to the enormous advance of the digital world on daily life.
The electronic prescription system will coexist with the paper recipe.
Photo: Mariana Villa
Controlled electronic prescriptions
In addition to Vizzotti, several officials from the Health portfolio were at the meeting, perhaps in line with the emphasis that the Minister placed regarding the "enormous complexity" that law 27553, sanctioned in August 2020, when by The ASPO had to enable the photo-recipes, a practical but flimsy resource, which -it was known- should expire as soon as the quarantine ended.
In addition to María Teresa Iturburu, national director of Quality in Health Services and Sanitary Regulation, there were Sonia Tarragona, Chief of Staff of the Ministry, and Claudio Ortiz, Undersecretary of Quality, Regulation and Oversight.
Ortiz pointed out that "the regulation of electronic prescriptions is federal, but it accepts joint work with each jurisdiction."
He also remarked that "it is progressive", in the sense that "it is marked that the platforms that are in use today can continue to be used".
“There is no problem with any platform;
it only indicates where we are going;
what issues should be improved in the future," the official clarified, before explaining that "
standards
are being generated with the provinces to, says the resolution, begin to register, and in March 2024, authorize the platforms."
Ortiz called this
the "oversight system
. "
Register of health professionals
The undersecretary warned that the countries that implemented the use of electronic prescriptions took
"no less than five to ten years"
to consolidate this modality.
It is a format that aims to overcome the (almost old) "handwriting" recipe, often unintelligible to the patient and even to the pharmacist.
However, the challenge is not easy.
Among other stumbling blocks that could be in conflict is the fluidity that can be achieved in a matter called "interoperability", that is, the interconnection between the systems and registries of provincial and national scope.
For example, to allow elementary issues, such as digital prescription apps
being connected to the country's pharmacy network
, which in Argentina includes some 13,000, or to verify the identity of the doctor trying to manage an electronic prescription.
The latter will occur when the federal health licensing platform (which combines the provincial registration records of health professionals) is modernized.
The Ministry is working on this, they emphasized, and promised that "no one is going to have to do any additional paperwork."
Personal data protection
For those concerned about the national backwardness in terms of personal data protection, it should be noted that, as there is a year left before these software have to "accommodate" official control, the accumulation and handling of sensitive patient data falls, for now , in
the good faith of those legally responsible
for those platforms.
They are the ones who, before December, must complete the form "with different technical details," Ortiz explained.
Although many doctors already use electronic prescriptions, a pending account that is added at this time of transition is the incorporation of the digital or electronic signature, a topic that was hardly mentioned at the meeting, but which was contemplated in the list of "standards ”with which it will be necessary to comply.
Consensus in the health sector
The digital prescription law was passed in the second half of 2020, more than two years ago.
Tarragona referred to the delay in the regulation, explaining that "work was underway for quite some time, throughout 2021 and in 2022."
“There were thousands of meetings and consensus was reached on the regulations.
No one can say that they do not know the deadlines that are going to be made known now, ”she remarked.
Clarín
asked if it was not on the horizon to create a national platform that would avoid the "adaptation" bump to come until March 2024.
They explained that, in effect, there will be the possibility that the provinces generate optional platforms, as the province of Buenos Aires did, which launched its own electronic prescription system;
technically, a module within the national digital medical record platform, which the Ministry promotes with special emphasis.
Post electoral plans
One of the health issues that Vizzotti is most concerned about is antimicrobial resistance.
That is, the uncontrolled use of antibiotics, which not only generates strengthened bacteria, resistant to drugs, but mainly an increase in the number of seriously ill patients, which is very difficult to treat.
Given that the digitization of medical prescriptions will allow the State to gather more information about the drugs that are prescribed and consumed, Vizzotti remarked that "when this works, it will be a before and after."
Clarín
asked him if there is a possibility that the registration and control of the apps will be frustrated, after the Elections this year.
"We are generating this now, without any electoral speculation," said the Minister, and clarified: "The deadlines will be established in the regulations.
The schedule has to transcend the electoral."
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