8 vendors certified under new interoperability program
A healthcare certification program launched early this year to help address interoperability has certified the first group of health IT products. Under the pilot program, a joint initiative of IHE USA and ICSA Labs, the products met rigorous testing requirements for security and interoperability.
The certified products are offered by eight health IT vendors: Baxter Healthcare, B. Braun Medical, CareFusion, Corepoint Health, Greenway Medical Technologies, Hospira, InterSystems and Masimo.
Products were tested and certified to meet requirements in the IHE Patient Care Device or IHE IT infrastructure domains which specify capabilities related to medical device interoperability, clinical-document sharing, patient identification, audit logging and security.
The certification by IHE USA, a nonprofit organization formed in 2010 to drive adoption of standards of interoperability in healthcare, also builds on specifications of the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT. The certification gives purchasers of health IT products independent third-party verification that products are suitable for health data exchange and function as intended.
The certification program was announced at the 2013 IHE North American Connectathon in January. The initiative stemmed from a growing concern among healthcare IT organizations that today’s software, medical devices and IT systems are often incompatible, making the secure sharing of health data a complicated and expensive endeavor.
“Products that are certified for IHE USA interoperability bring tremendous value to the entire healthcare ecosystem,” said Joyce Sensmeier, president of IHE USA and vice president of informatics at HIMSS. “As an industry, we need to set a high bar if we are to rise to the challenge of transforming our healthcare system. For the health IT vendors that have achieved IHE USA certification, this means their integration capabilities go beyond minimum federal requirements to deliver more robust, high-quality, standards-based products.”
The IHE USA Certification Program aims to expand beyond traditional EHR systems to include domains such as patient-care devices, lab, radiology, cardiology, dentistry and eye care.
Editor
Editor Beth earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and master’s in health communication. She has worked in hospital, academic and publishing settings over the past 20 years. Beth joined TriMed in 2005, as editor of CMIO and Clinical Innovation + Technology. When not covering all things related to health IT, she spends time with her husband and three children.