WHY B.I.R.O. ?

Health information is essential to ensure correct functioning of modern health systems.

Optimizing health care delivery requires an in depth knowledge of care processes: unfortunately, there is not enough data available on many aspects of health care across Europe.

Not many realize that a great deal of information would be directly available from health services organizations and can be directly utilized through better collaboration.

The topic is strictly related to the integration of health services: a common problem is the fragmentation between clinical and administrative activities, with direct consequences for both systems and the citizen. 

Health services information is frequently hidden, fragmented, dispersed, under-utilized, poorly summarized, and undervalued.
Few integrated approaches have been proposed to exploit the analytical capabilities of securely linking data directly from their point of collection to facilitate information exchange on aggregate values.

The plan of the B.I.R.O. project is motivated by the need to overcome some of the frequent barriers posed by the following problems:

• insufficient utilization of information systems by clinicians and policy makers
• poor linkage between regional data sources and European statistical agencies
• limited application of sophisticated statistical routines in European health reports
• inadequacy of software available in the public domain
• insufficient use of medical records due to increasing privacy concerns
• lack of standardized approaches for secure data transmission

In particular, the B.I.R.O. project aims at:

1. providing an enhanced capacity to combat a specific health concern, diabetes, through an improved monitoring of risk factors directly related to the disease, including obesity, impairment, social exclusion, and the much higher risk of adverse effects among aged subjects;
2. supporting policy-making through the systematic evaluation of different strategies for health care and prevention based on a scheme that is generally valid for all chronic diseases