NeHC webinar: Beacon Communities initiatives focus on analytics

Many of the Beacon Communities are focusing efforts on initiatives involving clinical data repositories, analytics and master patient indexes, according to Craig Brammer, deputy director of the Beacon Community Program at the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) during a webinar this week hosted by the National eHealth Collaborative (NeHC).

The Beacon Community project aims to demonstrate better patient care enabled by health IT, support lasting learning networks and provide lessons and best practices for other communities, Brammer stated.

Slideshow | NHIN 204 - Beacon Communities: Spotlight on HIE Success Stories

Craig Brammer, Deputy Director Beacon Communities Program, ONC

He cited two Beacon Community projects that are fulfilling those goals. The Indiana Health Information Exchange (IHIE) is preparing to expand its current work from nine counties to 41 counties. Serving central Indiana with 1.15 million in its target population, IHIE’s action plan consists of HIE-based quality measurement and provider feedback, remote telemonitoring and a pay-for-performance, accountable care organization (ACO) model and payor engagement.

IHIE also has selected numerous performance goals, according to Brammer. These include increasing the proportion of diabetic patients with controlled blood sugar levels by 10 percent and increasing the proportion of patient screened for colorectal and cervical cancer by 5 percent.

Brammer also cited the Rocky Mountain Health Maintenance Organization (RMHMO), based in the Grand Junction area of Colorado, which has a population of 298,028 in its geographic service area. RMHMO's performance improvement goals include reducing unnecessary emergency department utilization among children and increasing by 5 percent the number of uninsured children who are immunized at equivalent rates to other populations.

In addition, Brammer shared the results of a HIE study that consisted of data from nine of the 17 Beacon Communities. Of those nine, five identified hospitals and health systems as the most important stakeholder participants necessary to meet their Beacon Community target outcomes. Three responded “physicians practices and outpatient clinics” and one responded “regional HIO.”

With the exception of clinical messaging/secure routing (offered by five participants in the study), the nine "Beacons" offer comparatively few HIE services. Services offered include prescription fill status and/or medication history and electronic clinical lab ordering and results delivery (offered by four Beacons in the survey), and clinical summary exchange and electronic public or population health reporting (offered by three Beacons in the survey).

One of the greatest challenges in Beacon Community initiatives presently is getting stakeholders in communities on the same page to move forward a common strategy, Brammer noted. “We are all excited but what are we ready to do?” is a common question among stakeholders, he said. Communities are asking their stakeholders what initiatives are currently in place and what they need work on and with what urgency.

“This is a case of building a car while you drive it,” Brammer added.

Looking toward the future, ONC is collaborating with organizations including Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to focus on local community improvement as well as nationwide improvement, Brammer noted. NeHC stated it will be continuing the dialogue from the webinar on its Facebook page.

Prior to the lecture, NeHC unveiled a new Beacon Community video, directed by Jesse Dylan. To view it, click here.