The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) on Dec. 13 hosted a live demonstration of patient applications that import data from health IT vendors. These apps give patients access to a consolidated list of their medications from a variety of sources.
The demonstration was held at the annual Connected Health Conference, and showed how the recently developed Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) standards will help move patient care quality forward.
“We are incredibly encouraged by the advances our private sector partners have made to unlock data and empower individuals when it comes to accessing their medication information,” said B. Vindell Washington, National Coordinator for Health IT. “This is just the latest example of the health IT progress and infrastructure that has resulted from public-private collaboration over the past eight years to improve the health and care of individuals and communities.”
These efforts build on the “Interoperability Pledge” taken earlier this year by large health care systems, EHR companies, key professional associations, and more, where they agreed to implement three core commitments. One of those commitments was to help patients easily and securely access their electronic health information.
ONC has worked with those who made the pledge to identify ongoing initiatives where ONC could help spur progress. One of those initiatives was improving patient access to medication lists from multiple sources.
The live demo showed how data from Allscripts, CareEvolution, Cerner, and Epic can be transmitted to user-friendly, third-party applications, and gives patients access to their medication information in one place from different hospitals, doctors’ offices, or clinics that use different EHR systems.
