ABSTRACT
Finland has been among the pioneers of eHealth adoption and implementation in the EU and, in some respects, even globally. The first national strategy for implementation of health information technology (HIT), published in 1995, focused on the principle of citizen-centered and seamless service structures. Electronic patient records (EPRs) and filmless picture archiving and communications systems (PACS) cover 100" of both primary and specialized care and are the exclusive source of patient information in almost all healthcare centers and hospitals, as well as the large majority of private units. The health portal, Terveysportti, offers Finnish healthcare professionals a single access point to a variety of electronic tools and resources essential for their everyday work, including timely clinical practice guidelines and access to various scientific databases. The closest integration of HIT and evidence-based medicine (EBM) is to be found in the Evidence-Based Medicine Electronic Decision Support (EBMeDS) system.
