Dominican Republic To Be Center For Health Information Services

(December 16, 1999) Washington, DC, Santo Domingo - President Leonel Fernandez of the Dominican Republic launched a broadly based Health Information Services initiative at the Miami Conference on the Caribbean and Latin America hosted this week by Caribbean/Latin American Action (C/LAA).  A state-of the art Health Information Center to be operated by FONEMED USA (www.fonemed.com), out of the new Cyberpark in Santo Domingo will provide services to private clients and public citizens in the Dominican Republic and abroad.

The agreement came in a meeting between President Fernandez and Ken Bleakley, President of FONEMED USA and member of a consortium of companies establishing operations in the Cyberpark to serve the country’s growing market for healthcare services.  It includes a commitment from the Government of the Dominican Republic to support a one-year pilot project to provide Health Information by toll free telephone to 500,000 Dominican citizens.

“President Fernandez is committed to reducing the numbers of Dominicans who lack access to basic healthcare services,” explains Ambassador Don Planty, Executive Director of C/LAA.   Medical call center services provide a direct, immediate and cost-effective way of extending services to these populations by providing 24-hour access to Dominican health professionals by telephone. 

“The market for health information services in the U.S. has grown exponentially in the past few years,” notes FONEMED President Ken Bleakley, “and we expect to see similar growth patterns in the Caribbean and Latin America as the cost of communications continues to fall.  The quality of communications services in the D.R. makes it a logical base for export of medical call center services to Latin America as well as to Hispanic populations in the United States.  We look forward to working with the government to ensure that these services are extended to the local population.” 

Mr. Bleakley states that the high-tech Cyberpark currently under development was a key factor in their decision to locate in the Dominican Republic.  The consortium will move operations to the Cyberpark upon its completion in August 2000.  Other consortium partners include MicroClinique, Ltd., New England Medical Center International, and a group of local investors.  The group will market medical call center, telemedicine and hospital management/administration services in the Dominican Republic and abroad. 

C/LAA’s Miami Conference brings together heads of government, policymakers and business leaders from the Caribbean, Latin America, Europe and the United States.  This announcement was one of the many concrete outcomes of the Conference and reflects the hands-on approach taken by C/LAA in matching interests and generating results.