By Buff Colchagoff, CEO, RosettaHealth
Twitter: @rosettahealth
Twitter: @BuffColchagoff
Both the Sequoia Project and DirectTrust recently announced that they are exchanging more health records and connecting more provider sites than ever before – reinforcing how more EHR transactions and more States are being covered as connectivity expands for both.
This news reinforces how the increased demand for exchanging of health records, which is being further bolstered by true business incentives, is changing the current landscape. In addition, as a continuation of discussions from HIMSS 2017, health data exchange interoperability is no longer a just nice thing to have, but it’s truly necessary.
In many ways, we have moved on from the concept of interoperability, and health systems are getting down to the business of actually exchanging patient data effectively and securely. We are also in the post-interoperability requirements working group era where the language of exchange no longer needs to be discussed and debated. This is due to health data exchange actually happening in today’s care system.
However, while the numbers reported by Sequoia Project and DirectTrust are a positive sign for the industry, there continues to be room to grow. Although many health organizations are on one exchange now, or have one use case, there are many more use cases that need to be developed – in other words, more can be done.
In fact, DirectTrust has been exploring and piloting new use cases (i.e., automated clinical summaries going to and from emergency departments and medical practices, etc.), which has been bolstered by the underlying technology that can be leveraged in a wide variety of situations. This is a good thing, and points to how the era of health data exchange is going to grow, and evolve in ways never imagined.
The technology solutions that foster health connectivity will continue to play a major role. For example, RosettaHealth knocks down the barriers to effectively share health data– allowing anyone on any system to create sharing networks, or access other networks.
As we have highlighted before, we are experiencing a modern industrial revolution in healthcare, electronic health information connectivity. By moving beyond interoperability, this revolution will rapidly advance and will transform the entire care landscape.
This article was originally published on RosettaHealth and is republished here with permission.