Government is committed to Blue Button ‘more than ever’
More than ever, the government is committed to Blue Button, said Ryan Panchadsaram, deputy chief technology officer of the U.S., at the fourth annual Consumer Health IT Summit on Sept. 15 in Washington, D.C.
The initiative, which connects patients with their personal records, is a public-private collaboration with 500 partners and “it’s growing,” he said.
His comments arrived just as the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT announced the launch of its Blue Button Toolkit, replacing the Blue Button Implementation Guide, which includes recommended technical standards for sharing data with patients in a structured way, and marketing materials to help organizations communicate the value of online access to health record. The toolkit is part of a wider campaign to promote Blue Button as a means for consumers to access their records.
As these efforts gain steam, Panchadsaram tackled four common doubts around unlocking patient records:
- Will open work? Despite the fear that access to medical records could cause confusion to patients and create added workflows for providers, a study conducted by Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical Center found that open records do not add extra work, and that patients with access understand their care more, Panchadsaram said.
- Will seniors engage? Over the past two years, the number of Blue Button users has reached one million. “There are more seniors engaging,” he said.
- Will developers know how to implement? There are a number of resources out there to structure records, including the newly released Blue Button Toolkit. Innovators need to keep innovating and figure out what works and what doesn’t, he said. Noting that many developers are stressing the importance of a well-designed API to create data-rich apps, Panchadsaram mentioned FHIR, an HL7 standard, as one example of a restful API that can provide granular access to patient data.
- Google Health failed: Google Health failed in 2011 because of low adoption, but “in many ways, they were too early.” Blue Button is growing at a time when digital health is morely widely embraced, he said.
Blue Button also is providing a powerful use case for emergency preparedness. The Federal Emergency Management Agency has recently decided to include Blue Button content as part of its preparedness checklist, Panchadsaram said.
“We have so much to celebrate, but our work is not over,” he said. “Patient engagement and access are so important to improving our system.”