Mass. hospital's quest for data liquidity

Baystate Health has been working toward data liquidity and liberation as a critical pathway to successful population health management, said Joel Vengco, vice president and CIO, speaking during a webinar presented by the Institute for Health Technology Transformation.

To achieve the value-based payment model of the future, “we’re going to have to figure out how to be more efficient,” he said.

The organization developed a regional health information organization, called the Pioneer Valley Information Exchange (PVIX). “One patient, one record” is the mantra so that patients and consumers can have access to their information. “That is the foundation for data liquidity and liberation,” Vengco said.

PVIX has been an important foundation for Baystate’s region, he said, because it provides a standard way to have entities with different EHRs on different systems connect to a centralized hub that enables standard exchange and data extraction.

Aside from that centralized hub, Baystate is now delivering a patient portal they prefer to refer to as an engagement portal “because we like to consider it to be a platform to engage patients in a way that provides them value.”

Providing value is the major challenge facing healthcare delivery organizations, he said. “Meaningful Use Stage 2 is pushing us to deliver but how do we really make it engaging and sticky and get people to use the service? We want to engage them in ways that enable them to care for themselves in better ways.” At the same time, Vengco said he wants to keep patients loyal to Baystate.

Baystate also developed a Center for Analytics, specifically named so that people understand that it is a development platform “that’s going to centralize the way we access data and the way we analyze information.”

And, because data integrity is integral and crucial, Baystate wants curation to be standard and consistent, he said, because then “use of data downstream will have higher integrity and quality.”

The cultural component has been important to address as well, Vengco said. For one thing, “there’s still a misunderstanding of who really owns this data.” That creates more barriers for accessing and extracting this information. PVIX has been working on this for more than a year, he said, having conversations to make organizations feel comfortable with the idea of data being owned by patients. “We aggregate and collect data for the benefit of patients and to deliver the best care regardless of whether they are a Baystate patient.”

There are, of course, technical issues. There are lots of community HIEs but state HIEs have been difficult to sustain. “The HIE platform is the platform for data liberation because it really looks to address data extraction using standards. Standardization of the content manifests itself in this HIE platform.”

Creating groups or consortiums for extraction would be a velocity builder, he said, advising others to look for partners also trying to extract data from vendors. “Come together for some kind of group purchasing agreement and get some kind of economy of scale,” he said, adding that he thinks vendors are starting to come to the table for such discussions.

Data liquidity is something to aspire to, he said, and takes time. It’s worth taking the time because without it, “everything downstream will be an issue. Be precise. Focus on good master data management. Make sure you’re able to provide education. Teach people that this will take time,” he advised.

This is all so important because data is core for future success, he said. Care coordination and population health require data-driven decisions. “There’s no more flying blind.”

Baystate’s population health initiatives focus on three core areas: community engagement; knowledge and insight; and action. “If we can achieve knowledge and insight, our industry will truly benefit and we’ll have higher potential for achieving the triple aim. If you can’t take action on the data in front of you, it’s probably not good data. Good data enables action to deliver care to your population at a higher level.”

Baystate also is using data for innovation. Liberated data lets organizations present this information to innovators so we can achieve solution development more rapidly. “That’s not to say we won’t see it from our current vendors, but at some level we can’t wait that long.  When you crowdsource innovation, my hope is we can create an outcome of even more innovation at a rapid pace." One reason for the great value of Apple's app store, he said, is that there is a solution for anyone who a different type of workflow in mind.

TechSpring is Baystate’s innovation center which is using data to drive technological innovation. The center was initially funded by a $5.5 million state grant and is sponsored by several large vendors. TechSpring focuses on leveraging data to accelerate product development. They don’t work with pure startups but rather with mid-range startups “that just need to complete the last mile.”

“All of this is to say there are a slew of things that can be possible once you’ve got data,” said Vengco. "Once you liberate the data and create data liquidity, great things possible for us to impact innovation, quality and care.”