HEALTH and social services in all Spain's 17 autonomously-governed regions will finally soon be 'talking to each other' - a new computer system means any doctor anywhere in the country will be able to access a patient's medical history.
If a patient from Valencia travels to Valladolid, or from Barcelona to Badajoz, Madrid to Málaga or Tenerife to Teruel, doctors will still be able to read their entire healthcare and treatment file without having to ask a long list of questions.
Computer data at present is still only accessible by medical staff within the same region where a patient lives or is habitually treated - and, in fact, electronically-stored medical files have only just become a reality, since patients generally had to carry X-ray plates and paper-based consultants' reports to their GP for perusal, as he or she would not otherwise know anything about the actions taken at the hospital.
This poses a problem when residents go on holiday or for weekend breaks to other parts of Spain and fall ill or suffer accidents, or if they move house to another part of the country.
But health minister Alfonso Alonso's new draft Social and Healthcare Assistance Strategy will include, as a priority, setting up an interface so that any hospital or health centre in the country can read any patient's details, wherever they come from.
Minister Alonso says that within just five years from now, one-fifth of Spain's population will be aged 65 and over, and in patients of all ages it will be chronic, or ongoing and long-lasting conditions which become the main cause of disability, daily home care needs, and doctors' and hospital visits.
For this reason, he says systems need to be in place by then to guarantee any treatment plan or monitoring which has been started will carry on uninterrupted wherever the patient is based.
Eventually, the systems will include full data about dependent patients' care needs, including their current situation, their support network - family members, friends or professional carers who are mainly involved with their day-to-day - and even financial details to ascertain whether they may need necessary emergency help.
Read more at thinkSPAIN.com