An introduction to health information systems in the U.K.

Good health is not guaranteed to anyone. Regardless of your position in life, situations and circumstances which are outside of your sphere of influence and knowledge can hit you. It is at times like these that you are all thankful for the health care system that you have. There is a wealth of information about their services which calms fragile nerves.

Healthcare in the United Kingdom

The National Health Care System of the United Kingdom is one of the world's largest health care provider systems. It is based on the premise that every citizen of the U.K. has a right to have excellent health care. Thus, the health information system in this country is designed to inform each individual about the privileges concerning medical care and the way in which the hospital system is structured. It also provides nursing information for those people who might need home care or a private nurse. In order to stay abreast with the times and provide quicker and more flexible service, medical information about the illness or the condition of a person's health or appointments to be made or are already agreed upon, in most places, are no longer recorded with pencil and pad but is entered into a computer, so that it is easily transmitted for patient referral. This advancement has opened up a new branch in Information Technology for those who are now learning how to design computer programs to meet the needs of medical personnel. There are universities offering Information Technology courses in the fields of medical, clinical, biomedical informatics as well as health and healthcare informatics, because there are medical information systems being developed for every branch of medicine.

The vision of healthcare in the U.K.

What exactly is healthcare? Healthcare, in layman's terms, is the ability and willingness to take care of the people who are suffering from some type of illness, whether it is physical or mental, and insuring that the individual has the best possible care in order to get well. Within the health care system of the U.K., you will find this criteria being met. The NHS, for example, has various healthcare information centers and internet websites to inform the individual who needs to be taken care of. In fact, the three major pillars, (1) taking care of need, (2) free at the point of delivery and (3) based on clinical need and not the ability to pay, which mark out the NHS, are the guiding principles in making people aware of their health care information system. For more information about the healthcare information system within the NHS, please look at Disabled-world.com (medical healthcare and UK healthcare) or Nhs.uk.