February 27, 2020
Maverick’s Update
Only What Matters in Health Information Policy
HHS released a comprehensive strategy to make it easier and faster for clinicians to use EHRs and address related regulatory burdens.
Harvard Business School’s 17th Annual Healthcare Conference on session on the future of elder care morphed into a discussion on the importance of delivering digital capabilities for the senior population.
This article demonstrates how a mental therapy app may be a “particularly stark illustration of how limited medical privacy regulations are in the expanding world of online health.” And Consumer Reports found “sensitive information being passed along” from a reputable consumer app to its marketing partners.
The CARIN Alliance is looking for organizations willing to test their HL7 FHIR balloted implementation guides.
At this week’s 2020 CMS Quality Conference, CMS Administrator Seema Verma announced a new quality strategy that prioritizes modernizing quality improvement efforts through advances in data analytics and technology. It may be helpful to review AHIMA’s 5-part series explaining the CMS Quality Payment Program (MIPS)-- we are looking forward to reading Part III that will focus on interoperability requirements.
One Thoughtful Paragraph
HHS is expected to release the final interoperability rules soon and is pushing back against criticism -- even as Senate HELP Chairman Lamar Alexander cautioned HHS Secretary Alex Azar to “not try and do too much too fast” at a Senate Appropriations health subcommittee hearing on Feb. 25. Whenever they finally arrive, it will be a lot to absorb. How can you gain a solid understanding of the interoperability policies in the meantime? A few things to check out:
A Shared Nationwide Interoperability Roadmap. This will give you a great sense of the who, what, why, and when of health data interoperability, even if you just read the Executive Summary and Introduction of the Roadmap of this 2015 tour de force.
This is an infographic showing the interoperability journey.
The Sequoia Project, ONC’s “Recognized Coordinating Entity” to help create the Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement (TEFCA) that would help support nationwide electronic health information exchange (HIE) across health information networks (HINs), is forming a workgroup -- you can apply to participate (deadline is March 6) here.
Consider attending your trade or professional association’s workgroup on interoperability, or track the work of multi-stakeholder groups: CARIN Alliance, Health Innovation Alliance, and the more business-use-case focus of the Council for Affordable Quality Healthcare (CAQH) and HL7’s collaboration. Also, probably a good idea to go to HIMSS in March.