Fuji Xerox Develops Industry-First Electronic Storage System That Ensures Originality of Medical Records per Each Piece

TOKYO, July 14, 2008 — Fuji Xerox Co., Ltd. has developed the industry's first electronic storage system that can guarantee the authenticity of information of each medical record document. The system complies with guidelines set down by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan, and makes use of MEDIS-DC Healthcare PKI certificates for digital signature provided by The Medical Information System Development Center (MEDIS-DC), and the AMANO Time Stamp Service 3161 provided by AMANO Time Business Corporation. An experimental trial for the system was conducted at Tsuyama Jifu Medical Corporation Polyclinic Tsuyama Central Hospital to confirm practical viability.

Fuji Xerox will demonstrate the effectiveness of the system at the Fujifilm Group booth of the International Modern Hospital Show 2008, which will be held at Tokyo Big Sight from Wednesday, July 16 to Friday, July 18.

Despite the rapid shift to IT-based systems, notably electronic medical charts, the majority of medical-related documents produced at medical institutions are paper-based. This has driven increasing demand for a system that can manage, search for and utilize electronic medical records and paper-based medical records in an integrated manner.

In order to retain originality of medical records in electronic format, however, documents stored electronically need to secure the authenticity, visual readability and shelf life as stipulated in the Security Guidelines for Medical Information Systems (Version 3) issued by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare.

It is particularly important to ensure authenticity, which involves clarifying who made the record and when, and ensuring no additions, changes or deletions are made to the information.

By incorporating Healthcare Public Key Infrastructure (HPKI) authorized by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, as well as a time stamp that utilizes a trusted time source, in individual medical records, Fuji Xerox created a system in which the authenticity of the records is guaranteed by a third-party organization, and confirmed its effectiveness through an experimental trial at an actual medical center, which involved ongoing assessments and improvements. The system is an important base for promoting a true paperless environment for medical information, and for realizing user-friendly, integrated management of medical records.

To deploy its document management technology and know-how accumulated primarily from office solutions in the medical information field, Fuji Xerox has been conducting ongoing review work via an internal project initiated in 2005. Based on this project, Fuji Xerox established the specialized organization effective April 1, 2008, to realize full-fledged business expansion in the medical information field. Proving the effectiveness of the system through the experimental trial was the first step toward achieving this goal. In the future, Fuji Xerox will develop and propose solutions aimed at realizing integrated management of medical records, which will contribute to enhanced efficiency at medical institutions, and to improved quality and security of medical records.

[Comment from Takanao Miyashima, Assistant Director of Tsuyama Central Hospital]

We initially thought it would be difficult to create a system that enables integrated management of large amounts of information of medical care services, as it would require a review of current systems, including conventional medical workflow. The experimental trial was conducted during ordinary business operations without changing existing medical processes, however, which prompted us to set technical objectives aimed at the future practical viability of the system. We plan to introduce the system for real while working to resolve challenges uncovered in the experimental trial. We hope that Fuji Xerox continues making full use of their technology and know-how as a document professional that they have amassed in non-medical fields.