Interoperability (167)

Before implementing AI tools, Matt Murren, CEO of True North ITG, says leaders must ensure that data flows freely between their EHR and practice management systems, and that they know how the tool will fit into existing procedures.

PointClickCare's Brian Drozdowicz says that health systems, historically wary of making patient data available to payers, have gradually overcome that hesitation due to the positive impact data sharing has had on patient care and outcomes.

Rebecca Coyle, executive director of the American Immunization Registry Association, talks about immunization registries consolidating vaccine records from multiple providers and recommending additional needed doses.

At the HIMSS25 Public Health Data Modernization Forum, officials say pushing for more data and interoperability is key to keeping up with the rest of the healthcare industry.

While much progress has been made in interoperability in the past 10 years, Dr. Steven Lane, Health Gorilla chief medical officer, and 2025 HIMSS Changemaker Award recipient, says that broader data sharing through TEFCA is still in its early stages.

Interoperability, says Christina Caraballo, vice president of Informatics at HIMSS, is a team sport that breaks down silos among health systems.

Dan Torrens, eHealth Technologies CEO, discusses where providers are in shepherding patient data exchange across the finish line and speeding up time to care. "People are stuck in the current way of doing things. The infrastructure is there."

Government buy-in will help the healthcare industry propel dynamic registration of FHIR Endpoints in 2025, but the directory needs to be pulled into a trust framework like TEFCA, says Paul Wilder of CommonWell Health Alliance.

Providers are still stuck in document exchange because B2B data security under the HL7 standard is tedious. Paul Wilder of CommonWell Health Alliance says he is hopeful that the ability to ensure trust at scale is about two years away.

At HIMSS24 APAC, health leaders sought support for "full scale" interoperability and strategic data compliance within and beyond their countries, notes HIMSS President and CEO Hal Wolf.

Alexander Berler of IHE Catalyst explains how the organization educates vendors about the eHealth European Interoperability Framework and helps them test their products for different patient scenarios.

HIMSS Chief Scientific Research Officer Anne Snowdon examined Leapfrog data on 2,000 U.S. hospitals and found a direct link between achieving EMRAM Stage 6 or 7 and higher quality and safety results.