Community HIE Toolkit

Health Information Exchange (HIE) Community Toolkit & Roadmap

The HIE Community Toolkit is designed to support communities and individual health care providers interested in participating in the CORHIO health information exchange (HIE). Below is the step-by-step process, or roadmap, for organizing the community and participants for HIE planning.

Roadmap Steps at a glance:

  1. Individuals organize
  2. Identify HIE participants
  3. HIE awareness and education
  4. Engage leaders
  5. Complete community assessment
  6. Complete HIE assessments
  7. Formation of a clinical advisory committee
  8. Sign participant agreements
  9. Implementation

STEP 1: INDIVIDUALS ORGANIZE

The first step in planning for HIE is to organize a local group of health care representatives to "champion" the HIE project and act as advocates for implementing and adopting HIE within the community. Community leaders should brainstorm the vision of HIE within the community and organize a clear set of goals for establishing the HIE.

Common HIE goals include:

  • Strengthen clinical integration across providers and with hospitals
  • Reduce hospitalizations for asthma, diabetes, and/or other chronic care patients
  • Reduce hospital readmissions by improving care transitions
  • Assist in developing a community-wide set of quality improvement baselines
  • Improve early patient diagnosis
  • Enable community prevention measures
  • Improve medications management

A clear and consistent vision for HIE will greatly facilitate planning efforts within the community and promote HIE adoption among healthcare providers.

STEP 2: IDENTIFY HIE PARTICIPANTS

To provide value across a given community, the HIE must involve a broad range of participants.  Once an initial group of local champions convene and identify HIE as a community need, it is helpful to define and begin to engage the broader group of organizations and individuals who should participate in the HIE.

Recommended HIE participants:

HIE Participant Type Representation
Hospitals CEO, CIO/IT Director, COO, CFO, CMO, Chief of Staff, Hospital Based Physicians, Lab Director, Radiology Director
Office Based Providers
  • Specialists
  • Primary Care
  • Safety Net
  • Large Group Practices
  • Small Group Practices
 Physicians, Physicians Assistants, Nurse Practitioners, Midwives, CEO, COO CIO, CFO
FQHC CEO/Executive Director, CIO/IT Director, COO, CFO, Clinic Physicians and other clinicians

Nursing Homes / Skilled Nursing

(incl. Assisted Living)

 CEO/Executive Director, CIO/IT Director, COO, CFO, Director of Nursing
Mental & Behavioral Health CEO/Executive Director, CIO/IT Director, COO, CFO, Physicians and other clinicians
Imaging Centers CEO, CIO/IT Director, COO, CFO, Physicians and other clinicians
Labs CEO, CIO/IT Director, COO, CFO, Physicians and other clinicians
Home Health CEO/Executive Director, CIO/IT Director, CFO, Director of Nursing
Hospice CEO/Executive Director, CIO/IT Director, CFO, Director of Nursing
County Public Health Dept. Executive Director

 

STEP 3: HIE AWARENESS & EDUCATION

Contact CORHIO to get information or for help with scheduling a community HIE meeting.

STEP 4: ENGAGE LEADERS

Once HIE participants are identified and are committed to building HIE capabilities within the community, it is important to include leaders from the health care organizations that may not already be involved.  In many cases, the leaders may already be involved as the initial organizers or HIE participants. If not, it is critical to identify and engage those leaders at this step.

STEP 5: COMMUNITY ASSESSMENT

In step 5, community leadership should engage potential HIE participants to complete the Community Assessment.  The Community Assessment will be used by CORHIO to assess the community's readiness for HIE.

Each community should fill out ONE Community Assessment to the best of their ability and submit to CORHIO as specified on the Assessment.   Please contact CORHIO if you need assistance or support during the completion of the Community Assessment.

STEP 6: HIE ASSESSMENTS

The HIE Assessments are specific to each participant. The HIE assessment provides CORHIO with the high-level information on the participant's organization and systems needed to further engage with the organization to develop pricing and a high-level project timeline.

STEP 7: CLINICAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE

As the community prepares to implement HIE, the community must plan for their Clinical Advisory Committee.  The Clinical Advisory Committee is the community advisory group of local HIE users, led by physicians and focused on implementation oversight and clinical adoption. If you are interested in participating in your community's advisory committee, please contact us and we can connect you to the correct people.

STEP 8: SIGN PARTICIPANT AGREEMENTS

This is the final step before implementation begins. CORHIO will work with each participant to finalize and sign their Participant Agreement and Business Associates Agreement.  The Participant Agreement includes the HIE policies and procedures that govern use of the HIE.

Once the necessary agreements are in place, CORHIO will assign an implementation team to kick off the technical implementation of HIE.

STEP 9: IMPLEMENTATION

The community will be assigned CORHIO resources to assist in the implementation of the HIE, including functionality and adoption.  CORHIO will facilitate the design, build, testing and training of HIE functionality for each participant and within the community.  Once the HIE is functioning in the community and data is being exchanged, CORHIO will provide ongoing HIE support to users of the HIE.

 

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