1st Digital Health Study of the DR reveals that pharmacies, TSS and SISALRIL have high levels of digitalisation

• Only 12.1% of respondents considered that institutions are carrying out genuine digital transformation processes.

Santo Domingo: – The transition to the fourth industrial revolution has had a dizzying impact on every area of human life. The health sector is no exception to this inevitable reality and has identified digital transformation as a powerful ally in solving some perennial challenges relating to universal access, universal coverage and achieving the goals of health systems.

Digital transformation is the result of the harmonious involvement of three elements: people, processes and available technologies. The big question, then, is: what is the current state of digital health in the country?

To answer this and other questions, Arium Salud Digital commissioned the first Digital Health Study of the Dominican Republic, seen from the perspective of key players working inside and outside the health system.

Among the study’s findings is that important steps have been taken towards digitalising the health sector, with the first efforts dating back to the last decade of the last century. Some areas of the social and health system stand out for their high levels of digitalisation, such as pharmacies, the Social Security Treasury (TSS) and the Superintendency of Health and Occupational Risks (SISALRIL).

Between 80% and 90% of pharmacies use digital tools at the core of their organisation, says the study, carried out by Fundación Plenitud for the Social Security Observatory (OSES) of the Instituto Tecnológico de Santo Domingo (INTEC).

In the case of the TSS, the research highlights that it is fully digitalised, allowing employers to carry out their processes through a virtual platform that requires no human intervention to feed the members’ database. 

Likewise, the research shows that transactions between Health Risk Administrators (ARS) and SISALRIL are fully electronic.

Other features highlighted in the survey results were that the digitalisation efforts of the institutions interviewed stem more from their own decision than from a national market trend, at 18.6%, while 12.1% of establishments are carrying out genuine digital transformation processes.

According to respondents, inequality among Health Service Providers in implementing digital health stands at 11.6%, while 8.5% consider the Dominican health system as a whole to be an analogue sector.

There are several initiatives, with each organisation individually trying to take its processes into digital transformation and face the challenges this involves. The country has hospitals that did not necessarily start with digital transformation but by digitalising their services to put the patient at the centre of care. However, this responds more to a specific need for digitalisation than to a digital transformation process.

Some 16.7% of comments about the history of digital health in the public sector said that the “politicisation” of these projects guarantees their failure, referring to a set of attitudes harmful to the success of such plans. These included failing to continue the processes and goals of previous administrations, sudden changes of plan even within the same administration, and prioritising speed of execution over quality and good practice, among others.

The most widely recognised strength among the opinions is that across the health and social security sector there is interest in digitalising health, together with a willingness to act on that interest and a clear vision of where the process should be heading.

Arium Salud Digital is a company that provides digital services and tools with the aim of transforming how existing processes are managed in the health sector through interconnected systems, while facilitating interaction between the different market players and providing technology solutions for their effectiveness. The mission of Arium Salud Digital is to provide a digital health ecosystem that connects all the sector’s key players, with the aim of improving the population’s quality of life through efficient and secure solutions based on state-of-the-art technology.