The Cleveland-based MetroHealth System has announced that it has reached its 2.5 millionth health information exchange (HIE) since it began exchanging records with other healthcare organizations in 2010.
MetroHealth, with a main campus just west of downtown Cleveland, and with 17 health centers throughout Ohio, has exchanged patient records with 138 other organizations since it started using the Care Everywhere Health Information Exchange, launched by the Epic Corporation. MetroHealth began exchanging data with the Social Security Administration in May 2014, sharing more than 7,100 medical records electronically to date, it said. In June 2014, MetroHealth and the Veterans Administration (VA) formed a similar health IT data exchange partnership, which had approximately 400 documents exchanged to date.
“The health exchange partnership with MetroHealth has significantly improved coordination of obstetrical and gynecologic specialty care for our female veterans,” said Phyllis Nsiah-Kumi, M.D., director of women’s health at the Cleveland VA Medical Center. “These achievements mark another milestone in our continued efforts to use technology to provide high value, high quality, cost effective care to our patients,” said David Kaelber, M.D., Ph.D., CMIO of the MetroHealth System.
Kaelber added, “A specific ‘win’ that we saw in our first week of health information exchange with the Social Security Administration was one of our patients who was applying for disability benefits. With electronic health information exchange in place, his case was adjudicated the same day his benefits application was received. Otherwise, the typical adjudication process without electronic health information exchange can typically take more than six months.”
