‘Rainbow’ baby book plan

AUSTRALIA’S states and territories have confirmed an agreement to move towards a nationally harmonised baby book system, so that immunisations and growth milestones for infants can be recorded in digital form consistently across all jurisdictions.

The move was unveiled this week in Sydney at the Health Informatics Conference by representatives from the National Children’s Digital Health Collaborative, according to a report in Pulse IT.

The Sydney Children’s Hospitals Network is part of the group, along with eHealth NSW ceo Zoran Bolevich, who noted that the current paper-based system was “ever so slightly different” in each state.

The subtle variations are more than just in the colours of the documents, with the NSW, Tas and SA book being blue, the Queensland one red, WA purple, NT yellow and green in Vic.

Bolevich was quoted as saying the inconsistencies were a barrier to a “compelling and effective digital solution”.

The harmonised content will form the basis for a national electronic system that will in future be able to be connected to the My Health Record platform.

The next step is to create a specification for the data, with software vendors to work in collaboration with the project to ensure interoperability.

The collaborative, which is funded by the Australian Digital Health Agency, is also working on a digital pregnancy record.