New Zealand Ministry of Health
By working closely with the Ministry of Health, the Cluster is able to promote understanding of the NZ Health Information Strategy, engage in local e-health initiatives, provide input into special committees, and to take advantage of future strategy and policy developments. The Ministry of Health is a member of the Cluster’s Executive Management Board, and is a primary mechanism used by the Ministry to communicate to IT vendors on strategic issues. As part of this strategy, the Cluster hosts a NZ health IT engagement forum, where Ministry speakers present on strategic priorities and outline their programme of work.
New Zealand Trade and Enterprise
New Zealand Trade and Enterprise (NZTE) is the New Zealand Government’s primary agency for stimulating economic and export related growth. The NZ Health IT Cluster engages directly with NZTE who has a representative on the Cluster’s Executive Management Board.
In conjunction with NZTE we focus on opportunities for New Zealand health technology companies in offshore markets of interest. The Cluster runs international market forums that provide market intelligence and in market experience to interested organisations, and provides support for international business missions.
Tertiary Education Sector
By working closely with tertiary education providers, the Cluster can link the development of health strategy and policy with research. Also by providing feedback and representing the sector as future employers, we ensure that the training of graduates meets the continuing growth and demand for jobs in Health Informatics.
The Cluster’s Website and E-bulletin
The Cluster maintains a website that has up-to-date information on activities and events of interest to members, and contains a profile of every member organisation. Our website www.healthit.org.nz attracts considerable traffic as evidenced by the large number of hits from around the world. We circulate an e-bulletin every fortnight to members.
The Cluster’s Role & Services
The Cluster works directly with key government agencies and industry stakeholders such as the Ministry of Health, HISAC, ACC, New Zealand Trade and Enterprise, the Foundation for Research Science and Technology, and the Tertiary Education sector. We also have relationships throughout the wider health and ICT sectors. This enables us to facilitate communication between the Government, Healthcare Providers and Industry stakeholders. Further information on how we work with the different stakeholder groups can be found here.
Collaborative Health Projects
The Cluster leads collaborative health projects to allow members to showcase their expertise and develop their capabilities. The Cluster runs a concurrent programme of projects, with typically two or three projects in different stages of development. We are focussed on health technology and developing healthcare solutions that demonstrate the interoperability of systems along the continuum of patient care.
The diverse membership of the Cluster allows participation by a variety of organisations. We ideally look for a mix of multinational and locally based organisations that have complementary capabilities. Project teams are typically between five and ten member organisations in size.
Benefits of participating in collaborative projects can include; new reference implementations and case studies, local and international exposure, enhancement of existing solution offering, development of new solution components, experience in working collaboratively in a multi vendor environment, and the opportunity to form new relationships with other sector participants.
