Fujitsu and Shizuoka Prefectural Hospital Organization Set Launch for Regional Medical Network System

Fujitsu and Shizuoka Prefectural Hospital Organization, a local independent administrative agency, today announced that the regional medical network system they have jointly built will be launched starting in April 2011. The new system, which was commissioned under a regional ICT utilization network project grant by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, began a trial run in February 2011 involving three central hospitals⁽¹⁾ and thirteen outpatient clinics⁽²⁾.

Fuji-no-Kuni Virtual Mega Hospital ("Fuji-no-Kuni Net" for short), is a regional medical network system, based on Fujitsu's medical software package, that enables multiple hospitals and clinics to share a common electronic medical record (EMR) format for exchanging data and other information among themselves using a two-way, N-to-N hub topology (with N representing multiple users). Using a datacenter located within the prefecture, Shizuoka Prefectural Hospital Organization plans to establish the first regional medical network system platform in Japan that covers an entire prefecture. Furthermore, the organization aims to enlist the participation of medical institutions throughout the entire prefecture, spanning all eight medical districts⁽³⁾ (a total of 210 medical institutions, including 27 central hospitals). Beyond that, the organization hopes to extend the network to encompass nursing homes, pharmacies, and other related institutions, and to cover a larger geographic area. This would then allow residents access to a consistent level of medical services throughout Shizuoka Prefecture, even during emergencies, thus providing them with medical social support that offers a greater peace of mind.

Background

In recent years, Shizuoka Prefecture has seen a shortage of doctors leading to a decline in the level of medical services; shutdowns and understaffing in hospital departments; and a concentration of medical institutions in urban areas that leaves rural areas underserved and with lower-quality services. As the prefecture is subject to the risk of earthquakes that regularly occur in the broader Tokai region, located in the chubu(central) region of Japan along the Pacific Ocean, building a wide-area medical network that could cover the entire prefecture in the event of a large-scale natural disaster was an urgent priority. Shizuoka Prefecture had already been responding to these problems through measures such as creating the Shizuoka Prefecture EMR system⁽⁴⁾ and other efforts to strengthen regional medical networks, but with referral letters and other data still being handled using a variety of methods, including paper, fax, and CD-R,the administrative overhead imposed on administrative staff remained high.

To address this problem, Shizuoka Prefectural Hospital Organization set up Fuji-no-Kuni Net, a regional medical network system that enables multiple central hospitals and clinics to share EMRs, other forms of patient information, and imaging data. The system began a trial run in February 2011 that covered three central hospitals and 13 clinics, and is set to go into full-scale operation in April 2011. To raise the quality of medical care throughout the prefecture, the first platform in Japan that links together all medical institutions within a prefecture will be installed within the Shizuoka Regional Medical Network Center, with the goal of enlisting the participation of medical institutions covering all 8 medical districts in the prefecture (a total of 210 institutions, including 27 central hospitals), by fiscal 2016.

The Shizuoka Prefectural Hospital Organization selected Fujitsu's regional medical network software package as the foundation for Fuji-no-Kuni Net, enabling multiple central hospitals and clinics to exchange medical information among themselves using a two-way, N-to-N hub topology. This makes it possible to deliver integrated medical services from multiple facilities, so that, for example, a central hospital and clinic can combine forces, with each fulfilling the functions it can best provide, to offset the regional divide in availability of doctors and quality of medical services everywhere. Furthermore, this allows central hospitals which handle acute care⁽⁵⁾, and clinics which handle primary care, each to focus more on their respective roles and work closely together. This in turn, lightens the burden placed on central hospital doctors when physicians are in short supply or are in demand at off-hour walk-in clinics⁽⁶⁾. Moreover, the unwieldy process of referring patients from clinics to central hospitals has been digitized, with letters and replies being prepared and transmitted electronically, making administrative processes more efficient. In the event of a major disaster, past medical information on patients taken in from other hospitals and regions can be checked as needed, resulting in faster treatment.

By bringing about the improvement described above, Shizuoka Prefectural Hospital Organization seeks to provide a consistent level of service to patients throughout the prefecture, even in the face of disaster. It is also considering shifting Fuji-no-Kuni Net to a cloud environment, which would make the system more useful over a larger geographic area and make it possible to link nursing homes, pharmacies, and other healthcare-related institutions.

In addition to providing ongoing support for Fuji-no-Kuni Net, Fujitsu plans to provide functional improvements as needed. Fujitsu also plans to capitalize on the experience it gains working on Fuji-no-Kuni Net to bring wide-area medical networks to other prefectures.