CommonWell Health Alliance

See the following -

HIT Vendor Alliance Comments On Lifting Interoperability Barriers

Joseph Goedert | Health Data Management | April 26, 2013

The CommonWell Health Alliance, announced in March and comprising a handful of health information technology vendors collaborating to cooperate on systems interoperability issues, has responded to a federal request for information on ways to advance interoperability and health information exchange. Read More »

Hospital Health Information Exchange by the Numbers

Kyle Murphy, PhD | EHR Intelligence | February 8, 2016

Health information exchange technology is in use among hospitals across the country.
While advancing interoperability is the aim of several current federal health IT initiatives, health information exchange is already occurring. The mechanisms for exchanging health data exchange differ as to their output and usability, but they do bridge information gaps between healthcare providers...

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How Closed EHR Records Cause Paralysis

Take a step back from the challenges that surround health information technology (HIT) interoperability and you will recognize that market forces and a desperately fragmented health care system make hospitals and vendors act the way we do...The predominant proprietary HIT vendors know about the interoperability gap yet engage in prolonged foot-dragging on even basic data interfacing. Read More »

How Much Closer To True Interoperability Is CommonWell?

Kyle Murphy | EHR Intelligence | March 6, 2014

The CommonWell Health Alliance made waves at HIMSS13 in New Orleans when its founding partners announced they would be banding together to solve the challenge of making their EHR and health IT systems and services interoperable...

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In Healthcare, Time To Free The Data

Mark Braunstein | InformationWeek Healthcare | November 27, 2013

To justify optimism about healthcare IT, we need to free the data tied up in electronic health records -- and it is happening. Read More »

Key Organizations Come Together in Support of Patient-Centered and Interoperable Health IT

Press Release | National Association for Trusted Exchange | May 3, 2016

The National Association for Trusted Exchange (NATE) and CommonWell Health Alliance® today announced that each would become a member of the other’s organization. They have agreed to establish a mutual synergistic and complementary relationship with the goal of enhancing cross-vendor interoperability to better assure provider and patient access to health data regardless of where care occurs. NATE is a not-for-profit membership association focused on enabling trusted exchange among organizations and individuals with differing regulatory environments and exchange preferences...

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Key Organizations Come Together in Support of Patient-Centered and Interoperable Health IT

Press Release | National Association for Trusted Exchange, CommonWell Health Alliance | May 3, 2016

The National Association for Trusted Exchange (NATE) and CommonWell Health Alliance® today announced that each would become a member of the other’s organization. They have agreed to establish a mutual synergistic and complementary relationship with the goal of enhancing cross-vendor interoperability to better assure provider and patient access to health data regardless of where care occurs. NATE is a not-for-profit membership association focused on enabling trusted exchange among organizations and individuals with differing regulatory environments and exchange preferences...

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Leidos Team Touts Interoperability In Military EHR Bid

Adam Mazmanian | FCW | October 3, 2014

Time is running out for vendors to submit bids on the planned $11 billion, 10-year contract to deliver an electronic health records system to the Defense Department. The DOD Healthcare Management System Modernization (DHMSM -- pronounced "dim sum") is an ambitious plan to transform the delivery of care to the 9.6 million active-duty service members, their dependents, retirees and others...

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Mother Jones piece hits Epic hard: 5 criticisms of the EHR vendor

Akanksha Jayanthi | Becker's Health IT and CIO Review | October 26, 2015

For a company that is notorious for its lack of media interaction, Epic Systems often finds itself in headlines, for better or for worse. The latest Epic media storm was delivered by a Mother Jones piece in which the author criticized the vendor and the health IT marketplace as failing in its mission to help patients and save money through digitization. Author Patrick Caldwell wrote the healthcare industry has largely underachieved in its goal to digitize medical records and cut waste and costs associated with paper records.

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ONC fail: EHR 'data blocking' still rampant

Joseph Conn | Modern Healthcare | April 17, 2015

Manuel Prado, president of Viva Transcription, Santa Cruz, Calif., publicly complained two years ago about the high interface fees – up to $10,000 – that electronic health record vendors charged for each hospital or physician practice they connect to his transcription service. “That's data blocking,” he charged. “If taxpayers are contributing $44,000 or $63,000 (in federal Medicare and Medicaid incentive payments) for each EHR, it's not too much to ask” that they make interconnect charges free.

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ONC Finally Releases TEFCA—What it Might Mean to Public Health

On January 18, 2022 the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) finally released version 1 of the Trusted Exchange Framework,  Common Agreement and the QHIN (Qualified Health Information Network) Technical Framework (QTF). Several years in the making, these documents represent the latest attempt at initiating a national health information exchange in the United States. This project is being managed by ONC’s Recognized Coordinating Entity (RCE), The Sequoia Project, and was inspired by both the HITECH Act and 21st Century Cures Act.

ONC Tech Forum 2020—An Attendee's Perspective

I attended the ONC summer Tech Forum in August 2020 which brought together over 1,500 industry experts and Federal partners to discuss technical innovations in health information technology and their potential impacts on the healthcare ecosystem...One of the most interesting parts of the conversation was focused on the efforts made by Honk Kong to develop an open source digital health platform. Over the past 20+ years, Hong Kong has been pursuing a "one system, one record" policy primarily built on open source components. Though they had little money to invest at the beginning, for them open source is more about retaining control than about controlling cost (though the lower price tag certainly got them started down this path)...

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ONC's 3rd Interoperability Forum: Not Much to Report

On August 21 and 22, 2019 the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) held its third Interoperability Forum in Washington, DC. More than 600 individuals participated in person with many others viewing the general sessions via webinar. The conference began and ended with half-day plenary sessions while providing five tracks with smaller sessions in between. I attended the Health Information Exchange (HIE)/Community-based Information Exchange (CIE) breakout session on both days. The plenaries...focused on the current state and the future state of interoperability.

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ONC's Trusted Exchange—A Public Health Perspective

In January 2018 the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) issued a draft Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement (TEFCA), and related supporting documents, in response to a requirement imposed by Congress in the 21st Century Cures Act. The Act says that the TEF may include a common method for authenticating users, a common set of rules, enabling policies, and a process for managing non-compliance. Nowhere does the Act instruct ONC to determine an actual technical architecture in this process, though such a step is not precluded either. The primary document is in two parts: Part 1 is a set of principles that set the foundation for Part 2 which is a set if minimum terms and conditions for trusted exchange.

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Positive Future For Health Information Exchange On The Way?

Kyle Murphy | EHR Intelligence | July 8, 2013

Even with the increased adoption and meaningful use of EHR technologies, current attempts at healthcare reform will not avoid history repeating itself unless the EHR adopters participate in health information exchange (HIE). Otherwise, it is simply the condition of adding new solutions to those that came before them. Read More »