The following is a guest blog post by Jennifer Bergeron, Learning and Development Manager at The Breakaway Group (A Xerox Company). Check out all of the blog posts in the Breakaway Thinking series.
Electronic health records (EHR) aim to improve healthcare and processes for providers and patients on a number of fronts. In an ideal situation according to HealthIT.gov, the clinician benefits by having quick access to patient records and alerts, the ability to quickly and accurately report, and a path to safer prescribing. Patients should be able to spend less time filling out duplicative forms at clinics, have prescriptions sent automatically to pharmacies, and gain easier access to specialist referrals.
The International Journal of Innovation and Applied Studies points out that interoperability can work toward a resolution to several current problems including patient record accessibility and consolidation, and healthcare costs. As far as getting patient information and all available information when it’s needed, the report “estimated that 18% of medical errors that result in an adverse drug event were due to inadequate availability of patients’ information.” Healthcare costs are reduced when different entities can share and communicate common data and could save up to $77.8 billion annually.
Given the potential benefits, there are still opportunities to achieve interoperability. For example, not all healthcare organizations are using EHRs so data isn’t being collected consistently across the board. In 2014 there was an increase in the percentage of hospitals with EHRs. However, only 39% of physicians reported that they share data with other providers. Even though the data is available to share, some EHR users may still be living in a silo and haven’t reached full adoption. In addition, existing specification standards have not promoted interoperability. Even though there is data is available to share, few providers are tapping into that information.
To help increase data sharing, more attention is being paid to FHIR, or Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources. FHIR stems from HL7 (Health Level Seven) data exchange and information modeling standards. HL7 has been around since 1987 to develop families of standards used to automate healthcare data sharing with the goal to improve patient care. FHIR builds upon the interoperability uses of HL7 and takes into consideration the changes in technology and requirements. According to the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC), FHIR is used to enable data access, is used as the container to return query results, and will be used to build necessary security and privacy controls.
FHIR combines what are called “resources” — also known as an instance of data – that define data and are used for specific content. Within a resource are characteristics including “a common way to define and represent them, building them from data types that define common reusable patterns of elements, a common set of metadata, and a human readable part.” Collected data can be used and exchanged, searched for individually or in groupings, analyzed and examined.
Interoperability and the role of FHIR is not yet clearly defined. Going forward, the roadmap for interoperability built by the ONC will be watched closely. Guidelines are broad at this point to allow appropriate decision-making as paths are forged. A group of organizations called the Argonaut Project has committed to working with FHIR. HI7.org defines the Argonaut Project as having the purpose of developing “a first-generation API (application programming interface) and Core Data Services specification to enable expanded information sharing for electronic health records, documents, and other health information based on the FHIR specification.”
APIs are at work behind the scenes when we’re accessing information online. Although healthcare is beginning to harness the power of APIs these interfaces are present everywhere in our day-to-day lives. For example, say you are listening to Spotify and want to connect that application with Facebook. An API helps make that translation of information from Spotify to Facebook happen. Imagine the possibilities in the realm of data and healthcare. The development of APIs by the Argonaut Project is just the beginning stages of data sharing and interoperability.
In order to reach true interoperability and efficient use of FHIR, the first step is EHR adoption. Once data is captured into an EHR system, organizations can focus on data standards and clear data management, and have the ability to measure impacts to healthcare patients, providers, costs, and communication. Without the right, accurate data input, interpretation at the end of the process is not accurate or actionable. If clinicians are aware of how their engagement with data and proper input at the beginning of this process affects their practice, their patient’s experience and health, and healthcare on a broad spectrum, they can make a difference well into the future.
Xerox is a sponsor of the Breakaway Thinking series of blog posts. The Breakaway Group is a leader in EHR and Health IT training.
I’m glad the last paragraph in this posts stresses upon the need to collect good quality data or on making sure there is quality data being collected. Otherwise we have the problem of garbage in garbage out and no amount of interoperability is going to solve that.
Agreed. The right information used well can serve a great purpose, but we do need the quality to make it all work.