Dive Brief:

• One major purpose of implementing electronic medical records was enabling information-sharing among a patient's various healthcare providers. But many providers say this is the exact area they are struggling with the most.
• Many providers now have some form of medical records systems in their organizations, but studies have found that fewer than half of U.S. hospitals can transmit a patient care document, according to a report in the New York Times. Only 14% of physicians can exchange data with other providers.
• Not surprisingly, no one appears to be taking responsibility for the lack of interoperability. Epic Systems, one of the nation’s largest vendors, has been accused of purposefully creating walls so other systems can’t get in. The company claims that many of their providers are able to share information. Judith R. Faulkner, Epic’s founder, told the New York Times that regulators, who have said that stakeholders all need to come together to work on the issue, haven’t proven to be of much help.

Dive Insight:

Regardless of where the kink is in the chain, it is soon going to be incumbent on all vendors to make their systems speak to one another. Providers will begin pushing back as meaningful use progresses and they lose money when they can’t share patient records with other providers. Interconnectivity will also need to become more affordable than it currently is. Now, to share records, providers often have to pay connecting charges or recurring fees, the New York Times reported. These kinds of fees can be prohibitive for smaller hospitals. 

Epic and other large vendors are also competing for a Healthcare Management Systems Modernization Contract through the Department of Defense worth an estimated $11 billion. The main purpose of the project is to share information among various providers so they can track the care of approximately 9.6 million patients spanning the globe. Epic plans to partner with IBM to vie for the contract and hired the lobbying group Card & Associates in August to improve its interoperability image.