Pfizer, PhilHealth develop automated report system

An automated system jointly developed by Pfizer and the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) has helped bring about an unusually quick retrieval of a patient’s record, thus putting the government’s premier social health insurance corporation on target to deliver better and faster healthcare services to the poor.

Called the PhilHealth eLog Book System or PELS, the system has been proven to have greatly reduced work time for both PhilHealth and its accredited hospitals in their exchange of patients’ data.

Acting PhilHealth president Lorna Fajardo saw the eLog project as "a beginning of the fulfillment of my dream for PhilHealth and the hospitals to be connected on the information highway."

She urged the hospitals to take full advantage of the Pfizer-designed automated system.

Pfizer general manager Albert Mateo said PELS equips PhilHealth-accredited hospitals with the facility to prepare the data needed in compiling the mandatory monthly hospital report (MMHR) on a patient and send it to PhilHealth in electronic form to minimize delays in patient’s data retrieval and claims processing.

"Pfizer is grateful for the opportunity to partner with PhilHealth in the timely delivery of monthly reports and an efficient record system," Mateo said.

He also expressed hopes that other companies would find PhilHealth and Pfizer’s eLog project stimulating enough as to encourage them to partner with the medical community in terms of providing innovation.

Maria Isabellita, medical director of the San Lorenzo Ruiz Hospital, hailed the system, citing her hospital’s recent experience during the dengue outbreak.

She said the efficient and timely retrieval of records made possible by the system "greatly helps us in assisting patients with dengue. I feel it is imperative for government employees now to be computer-literate."

The MMHR, containing information on the admission and operating room logbooks, patients’ charts and adverse reaction to drugs, bed/room management and physicians’ profiles, is only one of two modules comprising the system.

The other one is the claims module consisting of the emergency, diagnostic/radiology and laboratory logbooks as well as claims processing.

Pfizer’s partnership with PhilHealth which provides social health insurance in the country further underscores its global commitment to discover and develop innovative medicines and make them available to patients; to educate and empower consumers to live longer, healthier and happier lives; to partner with government and private institutions on public health programs; and to show the way in the area of corporate responsibility.

Ongoing are a number of Pfizer-initiated or Pfizer-financed projects involving different stakeholders in healthcare and focusing on research and development, innovations in information technology and healthcare management, and medical information.

In 2002, Pfizer, in partnership with the Department of Health and the Ateneo Graduate School of Business, launched the Leaders for Health program, which for four years now has been investing heavily in training local executives and their constituents in remote places in healthcare management with the help of volunteer physicians.

It has also set up the Pfizer Virtual Library Network for doctors and selected medical and training institutions; the Website Partnership Project for medical societies; and Physician-I, an e-mailer program for medical practitioners nationwide.

Pfizer has also established strong linkages with the Philippine College of Physicians in the implementation of another national health program called HERO, which was launched in Legazpi City, Albay on the same day that the PhilHealth eLog Book System was introduced to the public. HERO’s thrust is education on the prevention of diseases.