Network Infrastructure
Americans are all about value. In retail, consumers flock to the two-for-one deals, buy-one-get-one frees, blowout sales and bargains that cut costs without compromising product quality. In business, employers reward employees for exceptional performance, quality service and customer satisfaction.
The Certification Commission for Health Information Technology (CCHIT) believes a private-public partnership would be better to run the future Nationwide Health Information Network (NwHIN), rather than a federal body alone.
Catholic Health Initiatives is partnering with Orion Health to build an enterprise-wide HIE that will enable physicians and clinicians to access patient records across its 100 facilities in 19 states. Once connected, CHI plans to link to statewide HIEs in states where its 76 hospitals are located.
The Joint Commission has found that communication breakdown is the overwhelming root cause of sentinel events. Terry Edwards, CEO of PerfectServe, an intelligent clinical communications platform, is trying to do something about it.
3M Health Information Systems opened access Wednesday to its Healthcare Data Dictionary, under an agreement with the Department of Defense and Department of Veterans Affairs. 3M President Jon Lindekugel explains how this will enable semantic interoperability for the joint DoD/VA integrated electronic health record (iEHR), and discusses other innovations the project could lead to.
When ONC stands up the NwHIN-Exchange in October, there will be at least 25 partners spanning military, private and public health entities sharing patient records with each other on the back of various standards.
In their Views from the Top session, "Mercy Rising in Joplin: How Advanced Planning and Resolve Are Helping Us Rebuild," Lynn Britton, president and CEO, and William Showalter, vice president and CIO, both of Mercy Health, shared their experiences of recovering essential information and services, reestablishing information and workflow and rebuild.
While there has been much talk in healthcare about using information technology on the clinical end to build an interoperable industry, the financial side of healthcare has been given short shrift.
Former Microsoft Health Solutions Group executive Peter Neupert will join Health Evolution Partners, a venture capital firm launched by former National Coordinator for Health IT David Brailer, MD, as an operating partner.
The Department of Veterans Affairs says it has signed up 30,776 veterans so far to participate in pilots around the country for the virtual lifetime electronic record (VLER) program. VA CIO Roger Baker discusses VLER and the other initiatives that make it tick.