Briefing: Health Information Exchange
In a Jan. 8 press conference at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, doctors performed the first-ever query on the MassHIway Health Information Exchange, a secure electronic health records system that went live in 2012. The Beth Israel doctors simulated how the system would work if an unresponsive patient were to arrive at the hospital. Using MassHIway, doctors were able to pull up medical records from three different providers, allowing them to avoid harmful drug interactions and allergic reactions, duplicative testing and delayed diagnoses.
Why is this significant?
This so-called query-and-retrieve system enhances MassHIway's capabilities. Until this month, health care providers that had signed on to MassHIway, designed by the state Executive Office of Health and Human Services (HHS), could send records to each other, but searching the database for a patient's records wasn't possible.
“The new MassHIway technology enables providers to more quickly diagnose patient conditions,” HHS Secretary John Polanowicz said. “It will allow providers to better prevent medical errors ... and will help discontinue fax- and paper-based records that take precious time and cost millions of dollars.”
Alec Loftus, an agency spokesman, said this second-phase rollout of MassHIway marks the completion of its major functions, but was also a “call to action.”
Who is involved?
Fifty-five major health care providers across Massachusetts are now using MassHIWay. The state's health care cost-containment legislation of 2012 requires the rest to sign on by 2017. Among the Central Massachusetts providers that have signed on are Saint Vincent Hospital, the Central Massachusetts Independent Physicians Association, UMass Memorial Health Care, Milford Regional Medical Center and Harrington Memorial Hospital.
What's the cost to the provider?
Small health care providers, such as solo practitioners, are charged an annual $60 fee to participate, while larger providers pay $27,500, according to Loftus. However, implementing the requisite electronic infrastructure, which providers are required to do under both state and federal health care reform, is more expensive. The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology cites studies that have found electronic health record systems may cost a provider between $15,000 and $70,000.
Several federal grants have been issued to help providers with the cost of implementation, but there's more work to be done. Loftus said approximately 85 percent of Massachusetts health care providers use electronic health records, and the administration is working with the rest.
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