Sustainable Health Data Exchange

It turns out that setting up a health information exchange is relatively easy. Sustaining one is tricky.

That's the contention of a report, "Best Practices: Establishing Sustainable Health Information Exchange," released Monday by IDC Health Insights, a health IT consultancy based in Framingham, Mass.

"While many (enterprise or community health information exchanges) have attempted to become sustainable, financially viable entities, only some have succeeded," IDC says in a news release.

The company developed a set of best practices based on interviews with about 50 executives from enterprise, regional and statewide health information organizations, which it refers to as HIOs.

The first step is to understand the exchange's clinical, business and technical requirements before trying to identify solutions or a health IT vendor, the company says.

The report also finds that:

• Exchanges must promote collaboration for patient-centric care.
• Interoperability is a transformation project that requires close coordination with stakeholders.
• Resolving privacy and security challenges -- which are central to an exchange's ability to receive meaningful-use incentives for electronic health records -- takes longer than solving technology challenges.