Tag Archives: meaningful use

Patient-centric Approaches to Data are Great…Except When They’re Not

By

infrastructureIn a variety of recent private and panel discussions with health and policy leaders, I’ve heard encouraging talk around interoperability through open and available application programming interfaces (APIs). Public comments by Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Acting Administrator Andy Slavitt indicate there is sincere commitment to making this a reality.

While this momentum seems promising, when Meaningful Use Stage 3 is mentioned – particularly its requirements for making data available to patient facing applications – I see the potential for unintended and terrible consequences for clinician workflows.

Continue reading →

What stage of “Meaningful Interoperability” are you?

By

interoperable-600x300The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) just released what it calls “A 10-Year Vision to Achieve an Interoperable Health IT Infrastructure.” The directive generating the most attention calls for “a common set of electronic clinical information…at the nationwide level by the end of 2017.”  According to ONC, the common data set would consist of about 20 basic elements, such as patient demographics and lab test results.

At first blush, the ONC directive is a small step in the right direction, but sets the bar awfully low. Rest assured that vendors will consider 20 basic elements the maximum data set, not the minimum. A more effective approach would, for example, specify vocabularies (LOINC, RxNORM), document types (JSON, XML) and transport mechanisms (HTTPS or other TLS) to be used when sending or receiving data instead of focusing on the data elements themselves.

Continue reading →

Data-Driven Evaluation of Mobility’s Impact

By

nextgov-mediumHealthcare is rapidly evolving, and more than ever, hospitals are under extreme pressure to continuously identify ways to improve performance and justify every expense. In this type of environment, technological innovation alone will not prove sufficient. Instead, making sure technology is successfully implemented and processes are streamlined to ensure adoption and maximize value becomes the currency of improvement.

Continue reading →