An article published in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association
on Jan. 21, questioned whether the federal government’s shift away from
regional health information organizations (RHIOs) in favor of
information exchange is best for the Nationwide Health Information
Network (NwHIN).
Leslie Lenert, MD, MS, department of medicine, University of Utah in
Salt Lake City, and colleagues wrote, "In the midst of a US $30 billion
investment in the NwHIN and EHRs systems, a significant change in the
architecture of the NwHIN is taking place.”
Prior to 2010, Lenert wrote, the focus of information exchange in the
NwHIN was the RHIO but since 2010, the Office of the National
Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) has been "sponsoring policies that
promote an internet-like architecture that encourages point-to-point
information exchange and private health information exchange networks.
The net effect of these activities is to undercut the limited business
model for RHIOs, decreasing the likelihood of their success, while
making the NwHIN dependent on nascent technologies for community level
functions such as record locator services.”
Email to a Friend