Overall conclusions and recommendations

It was recognised that the application of IT in health care is evolving rapidly. Major developments are: 1. the support of the primary process with the Electronic Patient Record (EPR) as focal point together with order management and protocols/nursing care plans; 2. increasing exchange of data beyond the walls of the institution (shared care, transmural care); 3. the growing use of the Internet; 4. introduction of multimedia functionality in the health information systems. These developments have a significant impact on the security provisions required, so attention for security was unanimously judged to be more necessary than ever. 2. Access to patient’s data