Legal and regulatory aspects of eHealth : Putting eHealth in its European Legal Context: Study report March 2008

Céline van DOSSELAERE, Denise SILBER, Petra WILSON, Jean Herveg

Research output: Book/Report/JournalCommissioned report

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Abstract

The term eHealth, although now quite current in Europe and, indeed, throughout the world, still is rather new, making its first appearances in the scientific and policy literature around 1999. Its predecessors, however, date back to the 1960s when the concepts of health informatics and bio-medical computing began to occupy the minds of academic physicists, mathematicians, and medics. The 1960s and 1970s saw the development of computing technology for mathematical modeling applied to the healthcare setting, along with highly specialized, tailor-made programmes for complex medical models. The early 1990s saw the beginnings of the IT revolution, which took us from the back roads to the super highway. With the development of Internet technology, eHealth became a potential reality not only for healthcare practitioners but for every citizen. It was, however, not until the late A990s that lawyers and administrators began to question the extent to which existing legislation was suffi cient to cover the use of eHealth tools in the provision of healthcare to citizens. Over the past decade, a number of articles, reports, and studies have established that the use of ICTs in healthcare does raise a number of legal questions, but few have looked, in detail, at the extent to which European legislation could provide good answers. Th e Legally eHealth Report, therefore, seeks to examine some keys of the legal questions raised by the adoption of eHealth tools in healthcare. It looks at how EU legislation on data protection, product and services liability, and trade and competition law applies.
Original languageEnglish
Place of PublicationBrussels
PublisherEuropean Commission
Publication statusPublished - 2008

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