Interoperability

A new initiative permits states to request the 90 percent enhanced matching funds to connect a broader variety of Medicaid providers to a health information exchange.

(SPONSORED) One of the key trends will continue to be increased cloud adoption by enterprises and organizations.

(SPONSORED) Joe DeSantis, vice president of HealthShare Platforms, is responsible for all aspects of the InterSystems HealthShare informatics platform, including software development, product marketing and business development.

(SPONSORED) From a provider perspective, analytics, interoperability and value-based care are critically important, especially in relation to population management, care plans for patients and reduced readmissions.

LAS VEGAS – Signet Accel has launched Avec, a commercial federated data integration platform designed to offer interoperability to healthcare organizations, the company announced at HIMSS16. Avec enables analysis of complex, distributed healthcare data in a manner that is secure and protects the ownership and control of data at every site, Signet Accel said. It does not require changes in the process of collecting data, the manner in which data is stored, where data is stored or how data is structured, the vendor added. Signet Accel’s Avec platform was created at The Ohio State University in collaboration with investigators and technologists across the globe, the company said. The platform was developed with an investment of more than 13 years and $20 million, it added. [Also: See photos from Day 2 of HIMSS16] “We’re connecting data as it is and where it is,” said John Raden, Signet Accel CEO. “Providing physicians and researchers the ability to view, analyze and experiment with aggregated data from entirely disparate sources, globally, is a reality we provide our clients. We believe technology plays a central role in how data is used to cure disease.” Some in the industry talk about interoperability as purely a technical problem, others as a policy or standards problem, and still others as a usability or user experience problem, said Philip Payne, MD, co-founder of Signet Accel and professor and chair of the department of biomedical informatics at The Ohio State University College of Medicine. “True interoperability is when all three of these communities and their needs and approaches meet,” Payne said. “We’ve deliberately designed a platform that is useful to clinicians, researchers and decision makers—while also directly impacting patients, their families and their communities.” Avec links and harmonizes disparate databases across healthcare, enabling researchers to identify patterns and trends over a large patient population and offering comprehensive insights into both research and patient treatment, Payne added. Robust repositories of connected data are key to realizing the promise of precision medicine, a research effort aimed at improving health and treating disease by accounting for patients’ individual differences, he said. “We’re only just now seeing large systems partner to begin the long and arduous process of determining how to align, share and exchange data, but we want the industry to know that true interoperability is already here,” Raden said. “Avec connects data for our clients and enables them to safely share it, regardless of its starting point.” Signet Accel clients include The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center, the Alliance of Dedicated Cancer Centers, the Hairy Cell Leukemia Foundation, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs VINCI initiative in partnership with Hewlett-Packard, the Oncology Research Information Exchange Network, and a joint venture between Case Western Reserve University, the Cleveland Clinic and University Hospitals. At HIMSS16, Signet Accel will be demonstrating Avec in both the HIMSS Interoperability Showcase and in booth 12550 of the main exhibit hall. Twitter: @SiwickiHealthIT This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

LAS VEGAS – In a co-presentation with National Coordinator Karen DeSalvo, MD, at HIMSS16 Tuesday evening, Acting Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Andy Slavitt said physicians "want better technology." From both a policy and an innovation perspective, it's time to give it to them, he said. Before their dual appearance, Slavitt said, he and DeSalvo read each other's speeches; the audience laughed when he said she took issue with the tone of his prepared remarks. "I think your speech comes across as very negative," DeSalvo told him. "Why don't you re-read through that lens?" [Also: See photos from Day 1 of HIMSS16] It was a light moment, but Slavitt had a serious point to make: "She works with the technology community," he said, which is making tons of progress and, to judge from HIMSS16 so far, "generally pretty happy." On the other hand, "I've been spending last months with physicians trying to use technology," said Slavitt. "That may affect my mood just a bit." Indeed, health IT has made hugely impressive strides over the past five years, said DeSalvo. U.S. providers have tripled the adoption of EHRs, and the industry continues to build on those early incentives. On one hand, healthcare is getting better at spending smarter and having healthier patients. But there are challenges, she said, emphasizing that data needs to flow more freely. "On the supply side, we have built up an amazing amount of health information," said DeSalvo. "We have to set it free." HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell Monday evening announced that a who's-who of private-sector vendors, providers and health organizations have committed to more open sharing of data, which DeSalvo called a step in the right direction. "I couldn't be more thankful," said the ONC chief. [Also: EHR giants pledge to standardize health IT] But Slavitt – who said he and DeSalvo have "been working together for months" on some of these new policy initiatives, to the point where they can finish each other's sentences – said still more was needed. "I'm certainly not bashful about what we need to do better, and I'm not going to be bashful here, even in the face of some very good reasons for optimism, about ways we need to take our game up across the board – all of us," he said. The health IT industry has made a great start, said Slavitt. "But we're still at the stage where technology often hurts rather than helps physicians providing better care." CMS is committed to taking a user-centered approach to designing policy, he said.  "I'm asking you to do the same. Step back and look at what you don't think is working, and make it work better." Slavitt said CMS has recently undertaken its most concerted effort ever to listen to physician feedback, working with those on the front lines to understand their pain points. He read a number of physician quotes that should sound familiar to many: Meaningful use has become "too much of a burden," said one doc. "Most of what I'm doing during the day is entering data into the EHR," said another. One joked (or half-joked) that "to order aspirin takes eight clicks; to order full-strength aspirin takes 16." Physicians feel hampered and frustrated by lack of interoperability, said Slavitt. They think federal regulations in their current form slow them down and distract from care. They also find EHR technology hard to use and cumbersome. The good news, he said, is that doctors are "not describing problems we don't know how to solve. That makes Karen and me optimistic." CMS is "still a few months away from having details available on the proposed MACRA rule," said Slavitt. But he did share some principles of the agency's policy approach in the near future. "Job one is to bridge the gulf between our public policy work and what's actually happening with patient care," he said. "That has to become an integral part of how we do things." Second, he said CMS would hear physicians' requests to "stop measuring our clicks" and "give us more flexibility to suit our practice needs and, ultimately, more control." Third, providers wherever possible "favor a pull, versus a push for incentives" that lets "outcomes, rather than activities, drive the agenda," said Slavitt, indicating that CMS has received that message. Meanwhile, he said the agency would continue to use what levers it could to spread interoperability. "We're announcing funding to connect many of the remaining parts of the system that are not part of the EHR incentive programs but serve our neediest patients every day," said Slavitt. "Finally, we are going to wire up long-term care, behavioral health, and substance abuse providers." But in the private sector there are still too many barriers to interoperability, he said, from legal clauses to commercial impediments to intellectual property. That's not an excuse, said Slavitt. "The companies that live up to their commitments here will be recognized and applauded," he said. "And I strongly encourage you to recognize those that don't." Twitter: @MikeMiliardHITN This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

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