Interoperability

In October 2015, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) issued its Final Version 1.0 report "Connecting Health and Care for the Nation:  A Shared Nationwide Interoperability Roadmap", frequently referred to as simply "the Roadmap".  The vision described in the Roadmap includes a health system where:

• Individuals are at the center of their care
• Providers have a seamless ability to access and use health information
• Health information includes information from many different sources
• Health infomation is longitudinal, rather than just about episodes of care
• Diagnostic tests are not unnecessarily repeated, because test information is available to providers and patients
• Health agencies and researchers can rapidly learn, which helps them develop & deliver cutting edge treatments

In May of 2016, the ONC's Precision Medicine Task Force recommended the Roadmap should be revised to:

• Add information about Precision Medicine,
• More fully address patient-generated health data
• Consider high-value, non-EHR data sources of patient data, and
• Encourage the use of standard Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) to source data

Moving beyond EHRs as the sole source of health information - and considering the wider range of technology applications used by individuals, providers, and researchers - means dealing with a lot more data.  The variety of data sources, the dynamic nature of how this data is used and interpreted, and the demand for information to be ever more simple to access and act upon, means that organizations must find ways to make their systems more interoperable.

Clearly, work needs to be done - by all stakeholders in the healthcare ecosystem - to achieve this vision.  While progress is being made, there are still many barriers to delivering the right information to the right person at the right time.  Some of these barriers are technical, but many involve policy and governance issues, security issues, and, of course, financial contraints.

The professionals at JCS understand not only the technical challenges associated with advancing toward true interoperability, but also the business, organizational, and financial hurdles.  We can help your organization plan and execute both a strategy for pursuing interoperability, as well as helping you define and execute specific projects and initiatives to move you ahead.  Please Contact Us to learn more about how we can help you meet the challenges of interoperability.

JCS is also a proud and active member of the Healthcare Services Platform Consortium (HSPC).  HSPC is a provider-driven organization whose goal is to foster a vibrant entrepreneurial community to deliver the best healthcare solutions quickly, easily, and seamlessly.  Please click here to learn more about the HSPC.