HIMSS report: Incentivize interoperability for HIE sustainability

The realignment of financial and policy incentives is crucial to sustain and support health information exchanges (HIEs), according to a white paper published by HIMSS.

The 38-page paper draws upon challenges faced by other industries, in particular telephone and banking industries, which experienced transformation through the adoption of interoperable practices, technologies and policies.

To transform healthcare, the industry must move away from the current system of provider incentives to purchase and implement EHRs and toward those rewarding developers and others in the healthcare industry that design interoperable systems and prove their real-world value.

“HIMSS envisions a world where we move from static data to a liquid interoperable future, but to advance interoperability toward this goal, there are still challenging tasks ahead. Many of these tasks will require consensus building within the healthcare industry and the development of new policies, laws and ideas that have not yet been conceived or imagined,” according to the paper.

“This new white paper extends our vision of better health through IT and demonstrates support for the Office of the National Coordinator’s current 10-year vision of establishing interoperable health IT networks,” said Joyce Sensmeier, MS, vice president of informatics at HIMSS North America.

Read the full paper.