Dive Brief:
- The recently launched Carequality Interoperability Framework, created by The Sequoia Project, has quickly aquired five major players from the EHR world.
- athenahealth, eClinicalWorks, Epic, NextGen Healthcare, and Surescripts have all agreed to abide by the framework's data exchange principles, Healthcare IT News reports.
- The framework, published in December 2015, provides a general data sharing agreement so participants don't have to develop separate agreements between individual partners.
Dive Insight:
The framework, and its quick adoption by several major EHR vendors, indicates forward momentum in the effort toward cooperation in interoperability. The framework provides a legal backdrop as well as technical specifications and governance processes.
The Sequoia Project says the initial implementers will begin with a focus on query-based exchange of clinical documents, and develop further uses from there.
"The adoption of the Carequality Framework represents a major leap forward for nationwide interoperability," Carequality director Dave Cassel said in a prepared statement. "By these organizations committing to unified Rules of the Road, they are simplifying system-to-system connections to make data exchange easier for a significant portion of the healthcare ecosystem."
As Healthcare IT News notes, participant Epic had criticized the previously created alternative, the CommonWell Health Alliance, in early 2015 for its membership cost and required non-disclosure agreement.