Deadline: To be defined.

(07/12/2015) The European Commission's DG CONNECT and the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) have jointly updated a Roadmap that guides European and US cooperation on eHealth (also called Health Information Technologies*). Please have your say on the draft Roadmap.

The objective of the consultation is to gather comments and inputs which will be used to finalise the update of the Roadmap and to validate it.

Before answering the questions, please read the background of the consultation (see below), the draft roadmap and its annex.

A French and German version of the questionnaire will be added at a later stage.

Provisional deadline to respond: 11 March 2016

Views are sought from Member States' authorities, businesses, academia, organisations involved in eHealth, health professionals and any other interested stakeholders. 

Please state whether you are responding as an individual or representing the views of an organisation. We ask responding organisations to register in the Transparency Register. We publish the submissions of non-registered organisations separately from those of registered ones.

  • Answer online - The questionnaire is available in English (French and German will follow later) but feel free to answer in any EU language of your preference.
  • By Email: attach your reply as Word, PDF or ODF document
  • Write to: European Commission, DG Communication Networks, Content & Technology / Unit H1, Avenue de Beaulieu 25,  01/122 - B-1049 Brussels

Apart from the questions concerning the identification of the respondent, none of the questions are obligatory. Partial replies to the questions will also be accepted.  Please read the Specific Privacy Statement on how we deal with your personal data and contribution.

Background of this consultation

In December 2010, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the European Commission's DG CONNECT, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Cooperation surrounding eHealth/Health IT*. The MoU was signed to demonstrate our shared dedication to strengthen transatlantic cooperation in eHealth and Health Information Technologies.

In the spring of 2013, DG CONNECT and HHS published a first Roadmap of specific MoU actions. Since then, this Roadmap has guided our activities focusing on two priority areas (work streams):

  1. Standards development to advance the development and use of internationally recognized standards supporting transnational interoperability of electronic health information and communication technology, and
  2. Workforce development to develop and expand the skilled Health IT workforce in Europe and the US.

End of 2015, it was agreed between DG CONNECT and the US HHS to add a third priority area: 'Transatlantic eHealth/Health IT Innovation Ecosystems'. This work stream aims to encourage innovation in the eHealth/Health IT industry and ensure linkages to the other two Roadmap work streams. This has been described in the draft roadmap that is now the subject of this consultation.

eHealth Action Plan

The collaboration with the US on eHealth is part of the actions described in the EU eHealth Action Plan 2012-2020. This document, published (after a public consultation) in 2012 and followed up by the European Commission ever since, addresses barriers to make the most of digital solutions in Europe's healthcare systems.

* eHealth (also called Health Information Technologies or Health IT) is a term used today to describe the application of information and communications technologies in the health sector. It encompasses a whole range of purposes, from purely administrative to healthcare delivery, involving healthcare practitioners, healthcare support and administrative staff working in healthcare systems.