The National Health Authority (NHA) issued hardware guidelines across States and Union Territories for healthcare institutions like hospitals, clinics and health and wellness centres to promote digitisation in hospitals. The guidelines provide a basic framework to States/UTs for planning, assessment and procurement of the IT hardware (including IT specifications of various hardware equipment) to operate applications compliant with Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission (ABDM).

ABDM will simplify the processes and increase ease of living by connecting the digital health solutions of hospitals and other health facilities across the country with each other. The digital ecosystem will also enable a host of other facilities like teleconsultation, paper-less health records, QR code-based OPD registrations etc. The digitisation of health records will ensure that old medical records of patients cannot get lost and are accessible to them anytime anywhere. Ensuring the necessary IT infrastructure and implementation of Hospital Information Management Systems across health facilities at the State/UT level will play a pivotal role in the creation and exchange of digital health records across the ecosystem. 

The guidelines on the IT hardware specifications to support this ecosystem is available at https://abdm.gov.in:8081/uploads/Hardware_Guidelines_ABDM_e162cf7a7b.pdf. The document will help the States/ UTs in assessing the hardware requirements while planning and procurement of IT assets for healthcare institutions of all scales. The guidelines published by NHA are suggestive and recommendatory. States/UTs and health facilities have the flexibility to modify these guidelines based on local requirements and circumstances.