Vision statement

Digital health policy, practice and solutions are integrated into the mainstream of health systems around the world through collaboration with the Society.

Mission statement

Our mission is to contribute to the above vision by facilitating the international dissemination of knowledge and experience in digital health, providing access to recognized experts in the field worldwide and fostering collaboration between stakeholders.

Philosophy and values

Our vision and mission are anchored in our philosophy and values. We promote and support digital health activities worldwide, by serving as the primary global umbrella organization for national digital health professional societies in all countries, and in this vein, we provide assistance for the start-up of new national organizations.

We are a non-governmental and not-for-profit society, with formal ties to UN specialized agencies that are directly relevant to global health. Established under Swiss law, we are politically neutral and democratic, with a commitment to fairness in our fee structure and an institutional policy supportive of diversity, equity and inclusion in our membership. Finally, we are driven by an implicit oath to furthering the cause of the environment, sustainability and good governance (ESG).

We recognize that the digital health ecosystem needs the contribution of all categories of stakeholders. Membership in the Society is therefore open to:

• Councils
• Professional Societies
• Academic and research institutions and organizations
• Provider organizations
• Corporate and industry actors
• Individual health, care, technology professionals
• Students
• Nurses and midwives

These values enable us to craft overarching initiatives and programs, which are finely tuned to address the specific needs of each membership category. The initiatives and programs build on the ISfTeH framework, which provides a methodological basis for tackling issues of digital health development, especially in emerging markets. The ISfTeH helps its members in each stakeholder category to meet their professional aspirational goals as well as their practical needs.

1.  To move digital health further up the agenda of policy and decision-makers, we engage in advocacy by articulating ethical and evidence-based policies for the use of information and communication technology (ICT) in the health sector at international and regional levels.
2. To create and disseminate information and  knowledge about digital health and its potential, we manage knowledge generation and sharing activities at national, regional and international levels.
3. For digital health strategy, we identify frameworks and tools for digital health policies and strategies that can be used by countries and organizations to develop their own.
4. To address issues regarding a qualified workforce and professionals, we commit to developing (and/or identifying) initiatives on knowledge and capacity building on international and national basis.
5. For standards adoption and/or development, we support the development/identification of frameworks for digital health standards that are appropriate for various contexts.
6. For sustainable activities and business models, we identify implementation tools of sustainable digital health activities at sub-national, national, regional and international levels.

Building capacity for digital health

Beyond clinicians, there is a critical need for technical staff, who are competent in digital health, to help bring ICT to bear positively on health system challenges. Yet, the need for digital health expertise often is not part of the human resources for health calculus in some countries. It is the professionals who provide not only skills to keep systems running – from supply chain logistics to maintenance and repair of hardware and software systems. It is they who can articulate country needs in terms of development of technical staff for the health system; make projections of future needs, identify relevant staff profiles and advise on appropriate curriculum for education and training institutions to produce the requisite numbers and quality of digital health workers. Investments are needed to target the creation of a corps of digital health experts in each country. Professional associations are key to building and retaining such a corps in countries.

Organized digital health professionals can carry out a number of functions that are indispensable to further development of the use of ICT in the health sector of the country. Key among these are:

• building national capacity for digital health by supporting the development of:
  1. digital health experts;
  2. health providers capable of harnessing the power of ICT to improve their work (ePractitioners); and
  3. digital health literate citizens – better informed consumers of health services, who are thus transformed from passive observers to active participants in the therapy process; and
• developing the evidence base on digital health – what works, why and under what conditions, and ensuring the sharing and reapplication of this knowledge widely.

We support national digital health societies in countries so that they can better fulfill their role as a forum for digital health professionals to exchange ideas and share knowledge, as well as raise the profiles of digital health experts and serve as a watch-dog of the profession in the country. Via various platforms, we facilitate sharing of experience with professionals outside the country, to the mutual benefit of all involved.

Advocacy

There is a need for advocacy, to raise the profile of digital health locally, nationally and internationally. The ISfTeH employs a two-pronged approach to advocacy –  a specific advocacy initiative, and a visible and active presence at important digital health events.

Growing the digital health community

The ISfTeH is helping to build a global digital health community. It has traditionally done so through two main mechanisms. One is increasing enrollment in the various categories of its membership. The other is by organizing periodic events such as conferences, seminars and workshops. In addition, to these two mechanisms, the Society is engaged in community building via the Global Telehealth Community of Practice (GTCoP), with a planned publication of an annual review of Who is Who in digital health.

Digital Health capacity building

The use of ICT in health underpins the transformation of health systems into knowledge-based systems of the 21st century. Capacity building for successful operation within this new paradigm is a growth area in which the ISfTeH has invested heavily. The need for accreditation offers opportunities to profitably engage in:  a) becoming an accrediting body; b) supporting training institutions to become accredited; and c) developing learning materials and courseware in specific areas of digital health.

Human resources for digital health are going to be in increasing demand as more health systems adopt digital health practices. The ISfTeH student group is an important element in the supply of qualified digital health cadres in the future. In addition, brokerage services will be needed to link job seekers with opportunities in the growing digital health business worldwide. Finally, information on digital health activities needs to be documented and retrievable through a structured repository similar to the “Who is Who in digital health”, but focused on projects.

Sustainability

Another key advantage of adopting such a framework, which seeks to integrate digital health into the health system fabric, is its positive influence on sustainability of digital health projects. Sustainability is now routinely used to augment quality, access, cost and cost effectiveness, beneficiary perceptions, and provider perceptions (elements of the classic IOM model for assessment of ICT in health) to become the sixth dimension for assessment. It is the considered view of more and more observers that mainstreaming digital health is the most promising mechanism for ensuring its sustainability – in other words, let digital health sink or swim with the health system. So, if we weave it inextricably into the health system, digital health will remain as long as the health system exists. And should the health system fail to exist, digital health would have no purpose anyway, so nothing would be lost.

Brief on the International Society for Telemedicine & eHealth (ISfTeH)

The International Society for Telemedicine & eHealth (ISfTeH) is a federation of national professional telemedicine/eHealth societies, together with other institutional, corporate and inidividual members, representing digital health stakeholders in 100 countries around the world.

The ISfTeH therefore brings together leading global experts on all aspects of the use of information and communication technology in addressing health challenges. It is arguably the key professional body in the field of telemedicine and digital health in the world. In recognition of its potential to support digital health worldwide, the Executive Board of the World Health Organization at its 122nd session in January 2008 admitted the ISfTeH into official relations with WHO. Formal relations also exist between the ISfTeH and other organizations and bodies in the United Nations system and other international organizations. The Society’s network is a crucial asset for disseminating best practices in digital health.

It does so through thirteen working groups – on thematic areas of telemedicine and digital health, such as telecardiology, digital transformation leadership, the Working group on Women, telenursing, etc. Its newsletters reach an audience of over 25,000 experts around the world.