Christodoulides hails creation of national centre for clinical documentation

President Nikos Christodoulides on Friday hailed parliament’s approval of the government’s plans to create a national centre for clinical documentation.

He described the centre’s creation as “another important reform and a decisive step towards the modernisation and improvement of health services”.

“The government is consistently implementing its will for a health system which focuses on the patient, enhancing the quality and reliability of care and offering security in health,” he said.

Of the centre itself, he said that “the state is establishing for the first time an independent mechanism which ensures that healthcare is provided with uniform, clear, and scientifically documented standards”.

“In practice, the centre will determine how proper medical care should be provided, monitor its implementation, and evaluate health services, so that people everywhere receive the same quality and safe care,” he said.

He added that the centre will also set quality criteria and “support and train health professionals”, so as to “enhance transparency and the continuous improvement of the system”.

“This is a reform of strategic importance, which strengthens people’s trust and substantially upgrades the country’s health system. Health safety is our highest priority and we demonstrate it in practice,” he said.

The new centre will be empowered to develop clinical protocols, guidelines, and clinical pathways, while also providing training to healthcare workers and, when required, patients and other stakeholders.

Additionally, it will monitor and evaluate the implementation of guidelines, undertaking inspection programmes and accreditation systems for health services across the country.

With this in mind, parliament on Thursday night also voted to amend the law on Gesy so as to transfer the pharmaceutical advisory commission from under the control of the health insurance organisation (HIO) to the new national centre for clinical documentation.

The centre has also been powered to ensure the implementation of existing legislation related to healthcare and will therefore collect data on the quality of health services from the authorities and conduct analyses based on that data.