FINANCE Minister Colm Imbert says the government will be implementing several digital health initiatives by December 2025.
He made the revelation during his 2025 Budget Statement in Parliament on September 30, saying the aim was to create a fully paperless healthcare environment to improve efficiency and patient care, and it was crucial for modern healthcare.
“This will ultimately establish a unified electronic health record system, providing a comprehensive view of each patient’s medical information.
“Digitalisation is revolutionising the health care sector by establishing interconnected networks, enhancing flexibility, improving quality and safety, facilitating patient data accessibility, expanding service reach, optimising supply chain management, increased enhancements and enabling data-driven decision making.”
Imbert said the Ministry of Health was focused on enhancing the capacity, efficiency, quality and accessibility of public health services, including disease prevention, early detection, and effective treatment.
He said it was working on sustainable solutions to manage and prevent NCDs by providing targeted programmes and services like a gestational diabetes management programme, TTMoves campaigns and a 24-hour hotline offering medical advice, to reduce preventable mortality by NCDs by 25 per cent by 2025.
He said the ministry was also in the process of procuring equipment for the lung cancer clinic to provide advanced diagnostic and treatment services and it was addressing mental health through policy changes, campaigns and expanded services.
In addition, he highlighted some of the other technology-driven improvements in the healthcare system, such as the donation of eight advanced healthcare by the Indian government, two mobile clinics from the US Southern Command Humanitarian Assistance Programme, 1,000 blood pressure monitors from the Chinese government and 14 pieces of cancer diagnostic equipment worth $10 million by Phoenix Park Gas Processors Ltd.
Other achievements included 3,400 people receiving dialysis at $380 million, over 2,000 getting radiation treatment at $160 million, almost 4,000 receiving cardiac services at $50 million and over 3,000 vitreoretinal surgeries being performed under the External Care Patient Programme.
At the various regional health authorities, over 13,000 received dialysis, 7,000 cataract surgeries were performed and over 135,000 diagnostic eye exams were conducted. Over 265,000 people benefited from CDAP, which cost the government $190 million in 2021-2024, $721 million was spent on pharmaceuticals and $185 million on medical equipment upgrades.
Imbert added that the central block of the Port of Spain General Hospital was 60 per cent complete and was scheduled to be opened in March 2025. It will have 540 beds and would allow more clinical services to be made available to the public and the expansion of others, including surgical, laboratory and diagnostic and treatment services, ophthalmology and paediatrics.
Other upgrades to healthcare infrastr
