Interoperability: Align yourself with the gov't

A. Interoperability has been and will continue to be of great importance to the federal government. After investing billions of dollars to modernize the hospital and physician practice IT landscape, government efforts are clearly aimed at enabling the information contained in those systems to follow patients wherever they receive care—what we term “patient-centric” interoperability. Patient-centric interoperability has the power to help millions of patients. By working to align how our industry approaches interoperability with government efforts and initiatives, we can prove the value of post-acute care to both the government and referral sources.

Leveraging Government-Mandated Standards

Putting the focus on meeting the needs of patients means choosing methods to interoperate that our referral sources support due to their existing government mandates. This can drive acceptance and change in favor of our industry.

Partnership Approach

CMS is actively working to help automate and bring information into the HME world, and the private sector is already there. Companies are working together to deliver robust and scalable solutions by connecting health information across multiple care settings to improve patient outcomes and provider adoption. These efforts are noticed at the federal level.

Call to Action

Communicating the power of interoperability is essential as a next step. Many of us in the industry are actively engaged in discussions with CMS about how we can leverage the power of interoperability to meet patient qualification and reimbursement needs. Informed providers are a positive force to help carry this conversation forward.

Nick Knowlton is a vice president, business development, at Brightree. Reach him at nknowlton@brightree.com.

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