Ministry plans IT tenders - Chile .

(From Business News Americas)

Byline: Stuart Varney

(BNamericas.com) - Chile's health ministry Minsal plans to launch tenders for several IT projects this year, starting with a central database of patient information, Minsal digital agenda unit chief Renato Orellana told Bnamericas.

The health sector is an important part of the government's "digital agenda" and this first project would entail installation of a Health Information System (HIS), which would create a unique medical chart for each patient, accessible by all public hospitals.

"In this area we plan to launch international public tenders this year to implement test applications in different areas, for pilot projects that will run during 2006," Orellana said.

The health ministry is also working with Chile's IT industry association Acti to create the standards that will be used in the sector in coming years. To reach an agreement, both organizations have held meetings to create the Chilean chapter of Health Level 7 (HL7), an international standard for healthcare data exchange between computer applications.

In terms of financing, Minsal has a total budget of 2.2bn pesos (US$3.4mn) for 2005 that comes from internal resources and also from a loan by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).