Low interoperability costs up to 6.6% of healthcare spending

The OECD estimates that effective health data interoperability could generate benefits equivalent to 2.7% to 6.6% of annual healthcare expenditure. What does it mean in euros? If the European Health Data Space fails to make health data accessible and interoperable across Europe in time, healthcare systems could miss out on up to €150 billion in annual value by 2030, equivalent to around €410 million every day.

Disconnected systems cost billions while healthcare systems are under financial pressure

The OECD's July 2026 report, Interoperability in Healthcare: Towards an Interconnected Future, describes a healthcare sector that has invested heavily in digitalization while leaving much of its data trapped in disconnected systems. Hospitals, laboratories, primary care providers and pharmacies often use different software, formats and coding systems. Information may exist digitally, but transferring it between organizations can require manual work, additional checks or repeated tests.

For example, the Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra estimated that better health data interoperability could deliver annual savings of €1.95 billion in Finland, equivalent to 6.64% of national healthcare expenditure. The estimate includes more efficient treatment pathways, fewer delays and duplications, and improvements in administrative services. A Canadian study estimated annual efficiency gains of CAD 9.4 billion, or 2.71% of healthcare spending. For the UK, NHS-commissioned research estimated potential benefits at 4.31% of annual health expenditure, including gains from better data use and AI.

Applying the OECD's upper estimate to France's €353 billion in healthcare expenditure in 2025 suggests potential annual benefits of €23 billion. That is equivalent to 21% of the country's public hospital spending.

Interoperability makes health systems more efficient

The OECD report cites an England survey in which 95.9% of doctors reported difficulty retrieving clinical information from electronic health records. Some 93.7% said poor interoperability negatively affected their daily workflow, while 81.5% believed it could put patient safety at risk. Consequences include missing medication lists, incomplete histories, and repeated diagnostic tests.

The OECD identifies Denmark, Finland, and Estonia as countries with well-established foundations for national and regional health data exchange. Other countries, including Germany, are still developing common standards and improving data sharing across local and regional systems.

The OECD's earlier comparative research also highlights Denmark, Finland, Sweden, and Czechia for using unique patient identifiers to link more than 90% of national health datasets. Denmark performs particularly well in making datasets available, linking them and using the resulting information for research and healthcare monitoring. By contrast, the OECD reported that Germany did not regularly link its national health datasets in the 2019 to 2020 comparison. These findings concern data infrastructure and reuse, rather than every aspect of clinical interoperability.

The European Commission's latest eHealth indicator study, published in June 2026 and based on 2025 data, suggests that the EU's average maturity score for online access to electronic health records reached 87%. However, medical images had an average availability score of just 35%, compared with 89% for electronic prescriptions and 91% for electronic dispensations. Public healthcare providers were also better connected than private providers, with scores of 85% and 66%, respectively.

The OECD identifies incompatible data-sharing practices, fragmented technical infrastructure, and weak institutional coordination as major barriers. Proprietary data models, outdated systems, unclear responsibilities, and insufficient staff training worsen the problem. Buying an AI solution cannot compensate for missing data foundations – these will eventually boomerang and undermine AI's added value.

EHDS promises an interoperability breakthrough but it won’t solve all the problems

In March 2025, the European Health Data Space (EHDS) entered into force, promising to make Europe's healthcare systems interoperable. It sets common rules and standards for electronic health records, supports data exchange between systems, and creates a framework for secondary use of health data in research, innovation, and policymaking. It should also advance interoperability within countries by encouraging health systems and software suppliers to adopt more consistent approaches.

By March 2027, the Commission must adopt key implementing acts defining technical requirements and operational rules. From March 2029, the first priority categories, including patient summaries and electronic prescriptions and dispensations, are scheduled to become exchangeable across all Member States. The framework for secondary use will also begin to apply to most health data categories. From March 2031, cross-border exchange is scheduled to expand to medical images, laboratory results, and hospital discharge reports, along with additional requirements for secondary use.

EHDS introducing an interoperability regulation is a good start, but as the OECD report reminds us, it also requires leadership, data quality, governance, staff skills, and sustained investment. Hospitals need to treat interoperability as core infrastructure, with clear responsibilities and measurable outcomes. Otherwise, EHDS won’t help.

Operational readiness already behind schedule. Billions of euros will leak from the system annually

The 2026 Digital Decade report shows that countries have made progress in giving citizens access to electronic records, yet important gaps persist in data availability and healthcare providers' connectivity. Public providers have an average connectivity score of 85%, compared with 66% for private providers.

Preparation also varies considerably between countries. An independent EHDS Readiness Tracker published in March 2026 ranked France first, followed by Lithuania and Finland. Germany and Denmark were also among the higher-scoring countries, while Poland was placed in the middle-to-lower group.

Denmark, Finland and Estonia have established foundations for national health data exchange and reuse. Finland and Denmark have also developed strong capabilities for linking health datasets. By comparison, Germany has worked to improve standards and coordination across a fragmented landscape. The European Commission's 2025 monitoring results also show that Belgium and Estonia had already reached a 100% composite maturity score for online access to electronic health records. At the other end of the scale, Bulgaria, Romania, and Slovakia scored 10, 22, and 24 out of 100, respectively.

For example, Bulgaria will need years of investment to move from a readiness score of 10 to 100. Although the country has established a National Health Information System and introduced electronic prescriptions – and is investing millions of euros in further digitalization through EU recovery funding – meeting the first EHDS deadline in March 2029, covering patient summaries and electronic prescriptions, will require rapid progress in connecting healthcare providers, improving data quality and establishing consistent national governance.

If the European Health Data Space fails to deliver, Europe’s healthcare systems could miss out on an estimated €150 billion in annual value by 2030. Based on projected EU healthcare spending of €2.3 trillion and the OECD’s estimate of interoperability benefits worth 2.7% to 6.6% of annual health expenditure, this sum could fund hundreds of thousands of healthcare professionals or expanded access to preventive care. Without these gains, health systems will face greater pressure to cut costs while meeting growing demand for care.