Interoperability

Portrait of Elise Sweeney Anthony

Marching Forward: The Path to Operationalize TEFCA

Elise Sweeney Anthony | May 16, 2022

On January 18, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) and the TEFCA Recognized Coordinating Entity® (RCETM), The Sequoia Project, released the Trusted Exchange Framework and Common AgreementSM (TEFCASM). The next key step for TEFCA is the release of resources to advance its operationalization, such as standard operating procedures (SOPs). These SOPs will include specific policies and procedures to further guide QHINs and will identify, where applicable, necessary technical implementation requirements.

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Portrait of Beth Ellinport

San Diego Health Connect Takes a Big LEAP Over the Barrier of Consent Management

Beth Ellinport | April 12, 2022

Editor’s Note: On April 14, 2022 at the ONC Annual Meeting, San Diego Health Connect will be demo-ing their project in the exhibit hall.
How can we improve the ability of patient to convey their preferences regarding access to and use of their electronic medical record information? San Diego Health Connect – a recipient of an ONC Leading Edge Acceleration Projects in Health IT (LEAP) program award – developed a scalable consent framework for electronic health records to help answer this question.

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Portrait of Mike Berry

ONC’s Health Information Technology Advisory Committee: A Year in Review and a Look Ahead

Mike Berry | March 9, 2022

The Health Information Technology Advisory Committee (HITAC) plays an important role in ONC activities and objectives. Required by the 21st Century Cures Act, the HITAC has been operational since 2018 and represents a wide range of health IT stakeholders who inform ONC’s policies and programs.

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Portrait of Micky Tripathi

3…2…1…TEFCA is Go for Launch

Micky Tripathi | January 18, 2022

The Trusted Exchange Framework and Common AgreementSM is now available. Within the health information technology (health IT) world, few things have been as elusive as a governance framework for nationwide health information exchange. When ONC was formed in 2004, the concept of a nationwide health information network—where your information could be located across the country in a click—was a big picture vision that drove the federal government’s early health IT infrastructure, standards, policy actions, and investments.

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Portrait of Steven Posnack

Information Sharing After the 21st Century Cures Act

Steven Posnack | November 16, 2021

When President Obama signed the bipartisan 21st Century Cures Act (Cures Act) into law in 2016, it marked a significant shift in health policy and health law. Not since the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) has there been a more noteworthy change in how electronic health information (EHI) is approached under United States federal law. Importantly, the Cures Act’s information blocking provision should always be considered in the context of other laws that speak to how EHI is shared in health care.

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