ITU Workshop on
“E-health services in low-resource settings:
Requirements and ITU role”
(Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013)
Opportunities and Challenges for
E-health – Vietnam, a case study
Nguyen Quoc CUONG,
Vice Director, VNPT Hanoi,
cuongnq@vnpt.vn
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
Content
Developing countries & E-health
Vietnam’s characteristics
Health & ICT in Vietnam
VNPT & NTT cooperation
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Developing countries
World Bank: GNI per capita
Low income
Middle income
Lower middle
Vietnam
$1,005 or less.
$1,005 - $12,276
$1,005 - $3975
$1,160
E-Health
Weak health systems & infrastructure,
Shortage of health workers, Incomplete
legal & regulatory framework
Two facets: Public health & Healthcare
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Vietnam - Characteristics
VN
Urban population
29%
Adult literacy rate 93%
Health expd./ GDP 6.9%
Physicians/ 10K
12.2
Nursing personnel 10.1
Pharma. personnel 3.2
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
LMI
39%
71%
4.4%
7.8
15.1
4.3
4
Vietnam - Telecom
Standing out !
Fixed phone subs.
Fixed BB subs.
Mobile phone subs.
Mobile BB subs.
H.hold w Int.
Ind.s using Int.
*
**
^
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
VN
LMI
18.7% 6.0%
4.13% 1.04%
143%
77.8%
14.71%*8%**
12.5% 7.5%
27.6%^ 13.5%
2011 figure, Vietnam MIC
Low and Middle income groups
2011 figure: 34.05%
5
Health & ICT in Vietnam
Government
Plan for ICT in 2011-2015, established
specific goals at different levels
WAN, LAN and website development
Internet access in health service offices
E-learning in medical universities
Standards adoption: ICD-10-CM, HL-7,
DICOM etc.
E-healthcare, HIS etc.
Improvement of public health databases
Many data missed in WHO Statistics
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Health & ICT in Vietnam
Hospitals & other health institution
Mainly business processes and
management systems
Limited use of clinical applications:
EHRs, order entry systems, decision
support, pharmacy systems, etc.
More importantly: little integration!
Inside hospitals
Between hospitals and government
Between hospitals and social insurance
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Health & ICT in Vietnam
Hospitals ICT – an example
2000 beds, 3500+ out-patients/day
35 servers, 1200 workstations, no DC
17 separated softwares, developed by 7
companies
No common patient ID system  No
interconnection b/w diagnosis, analysis,
treatment, pharmacy…
No acceptance from Social Insurance
Authority for electronic records
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Health & ICT in Vietnam
Hospitals ICT – the visible outcome
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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VNPT & ICT for Health
VNPT
Flagship operator in Vietnam
Fixed, mobile, value-added… services
VNPT & MoH
Agreement with MoH on promoting ICT
application in the health sector
Discount 25-50% on all services to all
subscribers in health sector 
Join into projects at different levels and
different fields
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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VNPT & NTT Cooperation
Implemented in Hanoi area, by
VNPT Hanoi
NTT East / NTT Vietnam
Public Health
Introduction of NTT+VNPT’s expertise &
capability to local Health Service Office
Healthcare
Joint Study for e-Healthcare Service
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Join Study for e-Healthcare
Field trial: 06/08 – 31/10/12
Questionnaire Survey: 31/10-16/11/12
Implementation structure
Implementation Image
Data Management
System
In Japan
Field Trial
Users
Internet
VNPT Network
Direction
VNPT
Hanoi
VNPT
Body composition monitor
FTTH
Automatic
Graphing
FTTH
Receiver
Relay Key
NTT Vietnam
NTT East
Blood pressure monitor
Trial Users
50 sets
(200 IDs for the
maximum)
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
Health Advice
e Healthcare Service
Healthcare Advisers
Hanoi Medical
University,
Hospital of Post and
Telecoms etc
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Join Study for e-Healthcare
Purpose: To confirm the demands for
e-Healthcare service
Measurement items:
Body weight
Body fat percentage
Basal metabolism
Physical age
Estimated bone mass
Number of steps
Blood pressure-Pulse rate
Visceral fat level
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Join Study for e-Healthcare
98% care about something of their
health
Muscle mass
0%
No care
2%
Other
6%
Body age
31%
Body fat percentage
31%
Body weight
39%
Blood sugar level
63%
Blood pressure
84%
0%
10%
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
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Join Study for e-Healthcare
98% want to get advice from
professionals
Ever got advice on
health from
professionals?
Interested in
Internet-based
healthcare service?
Neither
Yes or
No
10%
No
29%
N/A
10%
No
10%
Yes
71%
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
Yes
70%
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Join Study for e-Healthcare
Recognition of measures
88% can tell their health condition from “blood pressure”.
Majority not familiar with the measures such as “body age”,
“body fat percentage” and “muscle mass”.
Do you know
what the word means?
Know
High recognition
Body weight
90％
Blood pressure
65％
Can you perceive your
health condition
from the measured data?
Can perceive
Blood pressure
Body weight
88％
69％
63％
Body age
Blood sugar
level
61％
Blood sugar
level
Muscle mass
29％
Body fat
percentage
Body fat
percentage
25％
Body age
25％
51％
37％
Don’t know
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
Muscle mass
Low recognition
68％
Can’t perceive
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Conclusions and Recommendations
The following points can be either a
challenge or an opportunity
Government
E-health awareness
Necessary legal and regulatory
framework
National strategies and capacity building
Integration of ICT into health systems
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Conclusions and Recommendations
Hospitals & other health institutions
Transition/Integration of existing
softwares to/into E-health systems
“First, do no harm" (primum non nocere)
Balance between current load of work &
involvement of E-health
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Conclusions and Recommendations
User
High interests in health, especially in
healthy diet, improvement of blood
pressure and weight reduction
Avoid complexity and inappropriateness to
local needs
Need familiarization of unfamiliar terms and
indexes
Reluctance in paying 
Tokyo, Japan, 4-5 February 2013
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Conclusions and Recommendations
Technology
Optical fiber and Mobile trends
Health data integration and
Coordination of health systems
Responsiveness to local demand:
Localization and Operability of the
devices and web application
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THANK YOU !
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