According to WA Health documents the agency will shortly procure software to provide an Enterprise Master Patient Index and an Enterprise Provider Index. Services include implementation and integration with other healthcare systems and data cleansing.

“The rollout of the [Health Identifiers] HI Solution will focus initially on public health providers,” the documents read. “The project will provide the technology, organisational capability and policy support to extend the solution subsequently to private providers.

“The solution will form a foundation for HIN [Health Information Network] programs such as Electronic Medical Records and Community Health Systems, and contribute to the rollout of National e-Health Transition Authority (NeHTA) standards and National IHIs [Individual Healthcare Identifiers] across all jurisdictions.

“Additionally, the HI Solution will be integrated with existing and proposed WA Health systems and interfaced with other providers’ systems and with the National Health Identifiers service.”

According to WA Health, the agency currently has more than 30 unrelated sources of patient and provider identification in use as a result of increases in the number of locations from which patients can access care, the diversification of health care delivery, and increases in the number of health care providers.