About us

The Institute of Health Information and Statistics of the Czech Republic (“IHIS CR“ or “the Institute“) was founded in 1960. The Institute is an organisational unit of the state and has been established by the Ministry of Health of the Czech Republic.

The National Health Information System (“NHIS“) is defined in § 70 par. 1 of the Act No. 372/2011 Coll., on Health Services and Conditions of Their Provision (Act on Health Services). In compliance with § 70 par. 3 of this Act, the administration of NHIS has been delegated to the Institute.

When processing personal data in the NHIS, the Institute proceeds in accordance with Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation). The Institute does not provide personal data from the NHIS to any other subjects, except for cases explicitly stated by the legislation (such as § 8 par. 5 of the Act No. 141/1961 Coll., on Criminal Court Proceedings, the so-called Criminal Code).

As an organisational unit of the state delegated by the Ministry of Health of the Czech Republic, the Institute is a component of the National Statistical Service and performs this activity according to Act No. 89/1995 Coll., on the National Statistical Service, as subsequently amended, including the protection of confidential statistical data in the manner prescribed by law. The Institute cooperates with organs of National Statistical Service, mainly with the Czech Statistical Office, provides connection between the NHIS and individual healthcare providers, and cooperates with providers of information systems run by other organisations in the healthcare sector and beyond it.

The Institute follows the principles of the European Statistics Code of Practice, which represents a common summary of European standards designated for statistical organs and for the whole European statistical system with the aim to secure high quality and credibility of European data. These principles concern, among other things, professional independence, confidentiality protection, reliability of the data and their precision, timeliness, punctuality, accessibility, intelligibility, clarity, comparability and consistency.

The Institute cooperates with associations of hospitals, expert medical societies, associations of physicians, health insurance companies and other organisations in order to make the NHIS contents more accurate and to utilise the collected data.

In terms of health statistics at the international level, the Institute cooperates with the WHO, OECD, UN, EUROSTAT and other organisations. Based on data from the NHIS, the Institute submits official health statistics from the Czech Republic. Within the framework of European statistics, the CZSI respects in its activities, inter alia, Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 March 2009 on European statistics and repealing Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 1101/2008 on the transmission of data subject to statistical confidentiality to the Statistical Office of the European Communities, Council Regulation (EC) No. 322/97 on Community Statistics and Council Decision 89/382/EEC, Euratom establishing a Committee on the Statistical Programmes of the European Communities and Commission Regulation (EU) No 557/2013 of 17 June 2013 implementing Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council on European Statistics as regards access to confidential data for scientific purposes and repealing Regulation (EC) No 831/2002.