Starting next month, Alberta Health Services will be putting the health records of many Central Albertans online so they are accessible to care providers through a province-wide system.
As of Nov. 6, patient records from Central Zone, as well as the Centennial Centre for Mental Health and Brain Injury in Ponoka and all rural lab services in the region, will be loaded into an online Alberta-wide system, said a spokesperson for Alberta Health Services on Thursday.
Much of the rest of the province is already part of Connect Care, which was implemented in phases, starting in 2019 and expected to take five years to complete. So far, many AHS sites across the Edmonton and Calgary Zones are part of the system, as are 24 sites in the North and South Zones.
Central Zone’s participation will mean all five healthcare zones will be connected through the online platform, allowing healthcare teams to get a more complete picture of patients’ health histories, said the spokesperson in an email.
The idea is that by 2024, all Albertans’ health information will be accessible from any AHS location in the province. It will move with the patients through their care journey, added the spokesperson on Thursday.
There will also be Alberta-wide access to consistent best practices information and other resources at their fingertips, she added.
When the 135 AHS sites from this region “launch” on Nov. 6, 76 of these sites will be fully moving to the online system and the other 59 moving part of their programs or services to Connect Care.
Patients across the province will also be able to access their AHS health information through Connect Care’s patient portal, MyAHS Connect, as each phase of Connect Care is launched.
For more information: ahs.ca/connectcare.