Secondary Health Data Becomes Accessible Across the EU

The European Union has taken a significant step towards enhancing cross-border healthcare by making secondary health data available through the newly launched platform, HealthData@EU. This initiative follows the implementation of the European Health Data Space (EHDS) regulation, which aims to facilitate seamless healthcare access for EU citizens.

As of March 5, 2025, the EHDS regulation is officially in force, establishing a framework for member states to share health data more effectively. The recent release of the open-source version of the HealthData@EU platform allows stakeholders to inspect, modify, and reuse the underlying code and technical documentation. This move is expected to bolster research, innovation, and public health policy across Europe.

HealthData@EU is designed to enable the secondary use of health data for various purposes, allowing researchers and policymakers to access vital information that can inform better healthcare decisions. The platform facilitates the sharing of electronic prescriptions, patient summaries, imaging data, lab results, and discharge reports in a standardized format across member states.

To ensure smooth data exchange, designated digital health authorities in each country are tasked with converting health data into a common European format. These authorities will be linked through a unified digital infrastructure known as MyHealth@EU, which is managed by the EU Commission. This infrastructure aims to define the data exchange formats and support cross-border projects leveraging secondary data usage.

Despite concerns raised by some organizations, such as the ABDA, regarding the potential impact on professional confidentiality and health data privacy, these issues have been addressed through careful legislative oversight. The ABDA has acknowledged the separation of technical infrastructures for primary and secondary data use as a positive development, affirming that the measures taken have helped safeguard patient privacy.

With the implementation of the EHDS and the launch of HealthData@EU, Europe is poised to enhance its healthcare landscape significantly, ensuring that health data can be utilized to improve patient outcomes and advance public health initiatives across the continent.