The provisional political agreement on a European Health Data Space (EHDS), reached early on Friday by Parliament and the Belgian Presidency of the Council, outlines that patients will be able to access their personal health data electronically across the EU’s different healthcare systems. The bill also gives health professionals access to their patients’ data, based strictly on what is necessary for a given treatment, and patients will also be able to download their health record free of charge.

Electronic health records (EHR) would include patient summaries, electronic prescriptions, medical imagery and laboratory results (so-called primary use).

Each country would establish national health data access services based on the MyHealth@EU platform. The law would also create a European electronic health record exchange format, and outline rules on data quality, security and the interoperability of EHR systems that will be monitored by national market surveillance authorities.