The National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) is to digitalise its services before the end of this year, the Executive Secretary of the organisation, Prof. Mohammed Sambo, announced in Abuja on Sunday.

Sambo told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that the digitalisation was part of initiatives to herald the birth of what he tagged electronic-NHIS or e-NHIS.

The executive secretary, who is the latest top government functionary to feature at the NAN flagship forum, said that the management of NHIS had already developed a framework to achieve the e-NHIS policy.

According to him, e-NHIS is a major reform that is being seriously pursued by the NHIS management to change the way the scheme does its business completely.

He explained that “the concept of e-NHIS is to allow for a paradigm shift from the manual mechanism of driving the company’s business process to an automated one.

“We want to see a process where enrollment will be automated and from the comfort of your bedroom, you can enroll into the NHIS register; select your provider, select your Health Maintenance Organisation (HMO) and even make payment.

“So, people will only come to NHIS office to get their Identification Cards (ID).

“We are even musing on the idea of electronic ID cards, so that you can just walk into the healthcare facility and you will be attended to.

“The scheme will have minimum requirement for the healthcare facilities so that they can continue to be in NHIS.’’

Sambo said also that through the e-NHIS, the entire health system could become automated, so as to make things easier for everyone.

He explained further that “with e-NHIS, we can even have electronic medical records of patients, giving their medical history till date.

“Electronic medical records also create room for tele-medicine and many more possibilities.”

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