The

evolution of NI has varied in each of the Pacific Rim countries. The adoption of informatics usually began as a vision by one or more individuals. Such people used any number of opportunities plus their leadership skills to promote and disseminate the use of ITs to support nurses in all areas of nursing practice. This occurred in healthcare, educational, and government organizations

 Events

external to the nursing profession frequently became the catalyst stimulating some type of activity by nurses toward the adoption of informatics. International and multidisciplinary links have assisted these beginnings and progression.

 Early

1980s- Australia, New Zealand, and Hong Kong have made considerable progress
South Korea

1990s-

 The

Asia Pacific Medical Informatics Association (APAMI) was formed in 1993 as a regional group of the International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA). APAMI has helped launch the national health care informatics associations in Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines and has generated awareness about the field in India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Fiji. Nurses in these countries who are interested in promoting informatics to their profession need to link up with this network.

Over 4 million is the total population in New Zealand. Predominantly found in the urban areas, with the greater Auckland area having over the third of the total population. In 2003, there were 32, 687 active registered nurses and midwives working there. Auckland, this city by default becomes the focus of the drive for greater health informatics awareness. Firstly, in the line with international trends in nursing workforce development, the Nursing Council of New Zealand established the new role of nurse practitioner.

 As

part of ensuring standards of practice, the government passed the Health Practitioners Competence Assurance (HPCA) Act (2003). This act came into force in 2004 and replaced the Nurses Act of 1997. The HPCA Act 2003 requires each health practitioner group to describe its profession in terms of scopes of practice. The purpose of scopes of practice is to ensure the safety of the public by defining the health services that health practitioners can perform

 Australia

is a federation of 8 states and territories. Has a population of just fewer than 20 million. In 2001, the national census indicated that there were 1,259 nursing workers per 100,000 populations where 51% worked less than 35 hours per week.

 Around

225,000 registered (80%) and enrolled (20%) nurses are employed in acute care hospitals (65%), aged and community care (35%). Of these 89% are employed as clinical nurses, mostly within the following specialties: -medical/surgical (30%) -geriatrics and gerontology (17%) -midwifery, obstetrics and gynecology (7%) The trend suggests that there is a need to for a greater proportion of nurses in the aged and the community care sectors

 Credentialing

and accreditation of nursing specialties is now being promoted. Nursing specialty and other organizations have developed and adopted practice standards, competencies, guidelines for curricula development, and various professional development programs. Following the November 2003 Australian Health Ministers Conference, it was announced that a national nursing taskforce would be established to drive major nursing education and workforce reforms as recommended.

 The

government, through the Ministry of Health chiefly funds healthcare in New Zealand Healthcare is available for all resident New Zealanders via a national system

Cost of consultation with the general practitioner is subsidized by the government Tertiary care is almost totally publicly funded

 The

government controls healthcare provision and funding through agencies such as the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC). ACC provides a range of health benefits and subsides to assists individuals in the event of accident. More recently ACC has targeted accident prevention and as incentive has weighted levies, charging more to those companies and organizations that have employee/member accidents.

 All

prescription-related medicines are regulated by the government through Pharmac. The public can purchase an increasing number of over-the-counter remedies, and there is an increasing need for drug information for medical practitioners, nurses, and the public.

 In

Australia, the Australian Refined Diagnosis Related Group (AR-DRG) standard has been in use for costing and funding purposes This Australian Hospital Information, Performance Information Program relies on data obtained from individual patient records

 The

New Zealand Health Information Service (NZHIS) database uses a unique identifier, which is assigned at birth, and is designed to follow the individual through each healthcare event in his/her life. The unique identifier is called the national health index number or NHI

 The

national minimum dataset (NMDS) is a single integrated collection of health data, developed in consultation with health sector representatives and required at the national level for policy formulation, performance monitoring, evaluation, and research. This data is reported to all hospitals. All information collection, storage, access, and retrieval in New Zealand is governed by the Privacy Act (1993) and the Health Information Code (1994)

 Australia:

In 1993, an agreement was signed to improve the quality of and cooperation in the development of national health information. It resulted to the National Health Data Dictionary of established data definitions and data standards to support EHRs, National Health Data Collection and Reporting Guidelines, national minimum data standard edits, and data policy guidelines

 National

Health Information Group (NHIG) and Australian Health Information Council (AHIC) are significant impediments to the provision of better healthcare outcomes, safety, quality, and cost efficiencies The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIH&W) developed the National Health Information Knowledgebase, and Internet-based interactive electronic storage site for national health metadata

 Both

New Zealand and Australia have many health informatics and related professional organizations and groups advising various government departments and specific projects. There tends to be a considerable overlap of members between these.

 Health

Informatics New Zealand (HINZ) is a national, not-for-profit organization whose focus is to facilitate improvements in business processes and patient care in the health sector through the application of appropriate information technologies HINZ acts as a single portal for the collection and dissemination of information about the New Zealand Health Informatics Industry.

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENTS NI in Australia began with the Royal Australian Nursing Federation (now ANF) Nursing Computer Group Victoria (NCGV) continued to flourish an hosted the Fourth International Symposium on Nursing Use of Computers and Information Science in Melbourne in 1991