Hungary

Since launching an electronic patient record system in 2017, Hungary’s efforts to further digitize its healthcare system were spurred in part—as in many countries—by the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the early adoption of electronic health data collection, data quality and the need for standardization remain major issues. The National eHealth Infrastructure (EESZT) ensures technical interoperability, but semantic interoperability continues to be a challenge.

Hungary’s strategic goal is to improve data quality and introduce standardized terminology to ensure effective integration and management across the entire healthcare system, with the aim of strengthening the country’s healthcare resources, infrastructure, and service delivery.

Joining SNOMED International represents an important milestone in strengthening the semantic interoperability of Hungary’s digital health records. The adoption of SNOMED CT will support the standardized, structured, and computable representation of clinical information - including diagnoses, clinical findings, procedures, and other health concepts - across interconnected systems.

Among the notable initiatives supporting the development of digital health in Hungary is a recent study in which Hungarian researchers, as part of the European Health Data and Evidence Network (EHDEN) project, mapped more than 6,000 inpatient and outpatient care codes to SNOMED CT. The goal of the EHDEN project is to reduce the time required to provide responses in real-world health research by establishing the necessary infrastructure within a pan-European, consolidated network, fostering collaboration in research methodologies, and supporting education within the framework of open scientific collaboration.