The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) has released a draft road map for implementing an interoperable health IT system over the next three years.
Called Connecting Health and Care for the Nation: A Shared Nationwide Interoperability Roadmap, the draft proposal identifies actions to achieve success in sharing information and interoperability, as well as outlines an implementation time frame, according to ONC. ONC said that the draft road map, which was designed in concert with the Federal Health IT Strategic Plan 2015 - 2020, is based on a set of core building blocks needed to achieve interoperability:
- Core technical standards and functions
- Certification to support adoption and optimization of health IT products and services
- Privacy and security protections for health information
- Supportive business, clinical, cultural, and regulatory environments
- Rules of engagement and governance
Of importance to radiology, the road map's list of 56 priority-use cases for nationwide interoperability include that "providers are able to access x-rays and other images in addition to the reports on patients they are treating, regardless of where the films were taken or housed."
Fulfilling part of the roadmap's plan for ONC to identify standards for core interoperability functions, ONC also today released its Draft 2015 Interoperability Advisory, which provides ONC's assessment of the best available standards and implementation specifications for clinical health information interoperability as of December 2014.
Click here for the road map and here for the interoperability advisory. Public comments will be accepted on the draft road map until April 3 and on the interoperability advisory until May 1.
