Gurgaon: Haryana’s digital health plan under Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission aims to allow patients to share medical records, prescriptions and diagnostic reports digitally between participating hospitals, doctors and laboratories, with patient consent. For Gurgaon, where private healthcare providers account for a large share of services, the success of this system will depend heavily on private sector participation.While 4,016 of 4,099 targeted govt healthcare facilities, or 97.9%, have been approved on the health facility registry (HFR), only 11.9% of targeted private and public-private partnership facilities have received approval. Haryana is targeting 100% saturation by the end of this year. In Gurgaon specifically, the gap is starker: only 538 of 5,011 targeted private facilities, or 10.74%, have been approved on HFR — below even the state’s private-sector average. Govt facilities in the district have fared better, with 133 of 142 targeted facilities approved.Speaking at a state-level ABDM workshop at Apparel House in the city on Thursday, additional chief secretary (health) Sumita Mishra highlighted the need to expand adoption of the digital health system in the private sector and the potential benefits for patients.“The success of the state’s digital health plan will therefore depend heavily on how quickly the private healthcare network joins the system. Under ABDM, the state wants to create a connected healthcare system in which patients can access and share their health records across participating healthcare providers,” said Dr Virender Yadav, state mission director of ABDM.The system is designed to let patients share medical records, prescriptions and diagnostic reports between participating healthcare providers with their consent — for instance, allowing a patient who undergoes a diagnostic test at one facility to later share the report with a doctor at another participating hospital without carrying a physical copy.Patients would retain control over their information, officials said. “Patients can decide what information they want to share, with whom and when. The ABDM architecture is designed around consent, with health data remaining with the facility where it was generated rather than being put into one central database,” said Dr Pankaj Arora, director of National Health Authority.Dr Naresh Trehan of Medanta hospital said the mission would aid long-term data building. “This process will help in identifying disease pattern and it will help us assist pharma and scientists,” he said.The system is built around digital registries including Ayushman Bharat Health Account (ABHA), healthcare professionals registry (HPR) and HFR. HPR provides verified digital profiles for healthcare professionals, while HFR covers hospitals, clinics, laboratories, imaging centres, pharmacies, blood banks and other facilities — registries also intended to help patients identify verified healthcare providers. ABDM is designed to allow different hospitals and healthcare applications to communicate through common digital standards without requiring them to use the same software.Haryana had created 1.9 crore ABHA IDs as of Sept 1, covering 64.76% of the state’s reported population of 2.9 crore. However, having an ABHA ID alone does not ensure medical records can be accessed across hospitals. “The healthcare providers generating those records also need to be part of the ABDM network,” said Dr Manoj Kumar, chief executive officer, PMJAY.Haryana has selected Mahendragarh as a model district to demonstrate end-to-end implementation before expanding the approach statewide. Mahendragarh achieved the highest ABHA coverage in Haryana. As of Sept 1, it had created 7,96,991 ABHA IDs against a population of 10,29,512, covering 77.4% — the highest among the state’s 22 districts. Gurgaon, by comparison, has 13,30,808 ABHAs but a lower coverage of 72.8%.
