N.H. HIE looks for help from close neighbor

The New Hampshire Health Information Organization (NHHIO) has selected the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative (MAeHC) to provide executive director management services for the implementation of the statewide health information exchange (HIE).

The NHHIO, a nonprofit organization created by New Hampshire legislation in 2011 to establish a statewide electronic health network for healthcare providers, selected MAeHC to help them lead the state's HIE initiatives based on the organization's reputation and experience working with the New Hampshire healthcare provider community via the Department of Health and Human Services and as the operator of the Regional Extension Center of New Hampshire.

As the NHHIO executive director of management services, MAeHC will assist the NHHIO board of directors in providing the overall executive leadership, strategic direction and management for the state's HIE initiatives which will allow healthcare providers to exchange electronic health information. The NHHIO also selected Orion Health as the technical vendor to provide the HIE technology backbone and technologies that will seek to enable statewide clinical data sharing.

MAeHC will help the NHHIO board of directors develop a platform of services to facilitate the secure routing of data between existing private, local and regional HIE partners. Such information includes summary of care documents such as hospital discharge summaries, referral and consultation notes, as well as lab results and imaging reports. To support the delivery of these documents and data, the NHHIO will implement security services such as secure messaging that will be built in alignment with national specifications as well as provider addressing and auditing. Future phases may include an electronic master patient index, record locator services and the expansion of services to other healthcare stakeholders.