Health Information Exchanges (HIEs) are a great idea. These exchanges enable health care organizations to share patient data, cutting down on storage costs, record losses and all the other problems associated with traveling paper files.
But not every health care organization can afford to join a HIE. Now, “afford” is one of those relative terms, so what these executives are saying is that they have other priorities than funding HIE membership. However, from my perspective as a standards guy, I can tell you one reason why HIEs might be too expensive for all their potential members: that's right, there's no industry data standard.
Different states have different data solutions. In November 2011, a group of vendors and state officials launched a standards and interoperability group which will attack the problem.
I'm not saying “I told you so”. Every new area of information sharing must be allowed to develop according to market needs. This inevitably means duplication of effort and transactional friction. I don't think you can mandate a standard ahead of time. The key point is that industry leaders must step in as soon as the friction is apparent to everyone involved, and push for standards.
The electronic health record (EHR) may turn out to be the most significant information product since the Gutenberg bible. I'm encouraged that the health industry is investing its expertise and attention on the standards issue now, while EHRs are in their youth.
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