Maine’s HealthInfoNet has selected a supplier for its health information exchange software and is preparing to begin deployment of a statewide network.
The organization, a nonprofit collaborative of physicians, health care executives, insurers, consumers, employers, and government and public health officials, chose a team headed by 3M Health Information Systems. The team will provide a data repository, master patient index and data dictionary for the exchange.
Thirty-two other vendors also responded to the solicitation issued last year.
Now that the vendor has been selected, implementation will begin with creation of a statewide index of records, using information from the state’s four largest hospital systems. Those systems’ patients represent about 70 percent of Maine’s 1.3 million residents, said Devore Culver, executive director of HealthInfoNet.
Under this system, hospitals will submit data in the form of continuity of care records. “We will do the match, tag and merge to create a statewide master person index,” Culver said.
At the same time, the network will work with pharmacy benefits managers and the state’s Medicaid program to develop a database of patients’ medication histories. Links with a rural hospital and a laboratory also will be pilot tested.
Statewide integration is expected next year, according to a report by HealthInfoNet. The speedy rollout is possible because of the small population involved and because Maine has only two major insurers, Culver said.
He said the exchange is expected to cost about $22 million over the next five years. That figure includes capital and operating costs.
From the battlefield to the home front: Managing medical data
Government Health IT presents Col. Claude Hines Jr., program manager for the Defense Health Information Management System, in this recent InSight eSeminar. Col. Hines discusses the health information technology and tactical challenges faced by the military medical community in Iraq, Afghanistan and other areas of conflict. In doing so, he describes the current information technology solutions for transferring clinical data between battlefield care givers to health care personnel at military treatment facilities worldwide.
