ONC Launches ‘Health Interoperability Outcomes 2030’ Effort
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) is launching a new initiative, “Health Interoperability Outcomes 2030.”
In a blog post, Deputy National Coordinator Steve Posnack, noted that later this year, reflective of public feedback, ONC intends to publish a prioritized set of interoperability outcomes that align with the agency’s interoperability vision for the nation and the 2020-2025 Federal Health IT Strategic Plan.
The core four areas emphasized in that strategic plan are: promoting health and wellness; enhancing the delivery and experience of care; building a secure, data-driven ecosystem to accelerate research an innovation; and connecting health data through an interoperable health IT infrastructure.
Notably, in previous iterations of its federal strategic plans, ONC originally focused on the adoption of health IT systems, such as electronic health records (EHRs), while then moving to a plan that focused on improving the health and well-being of individuals and communities. Going forward, the emphasis will be on empowering patients and giving them easier access to their health data, and a key aspect of this is having an interoperable ecosystem.
Over the next few months, ONC said it’s looking for public stakeholders’ takes “on aspirational and achievable health interoperability outcome statements. Your perspectives will help shape our thinking and what we, as a nation, seek to achieve this decade,” the blog post read.
As part of the effort, ONC is asking healthcare leaders to fill in responses with their best formulation of a health interoperability outcome – sort of like an “interoperability Mad Lib.” Offering an example of what ONC is looking for, Posnack gave two alternative framings to get people going:
“Because of interoperability, ______ before/by 2030.”
“Because of interoperability, before/by 2030 [who] will [what].”
“Keep in mind that a well framed interoperability outcome will be stated concretely with a reasonably intuitive way to measure progress and/or whether the outcome has been reached by 2030,” said Posnack.
For example, the post offered, “because of interoperability, faxes are no longer used in clinical care before/by 2030. As another example, because of interoperability, before/by 2030 everyone that is part of a care team will have accurate, up-to-date clinical information prior to providing care.”
Individuals can go to HealthIT.gov/HealthInterop2030 or engage with ONC on their Twitter account #HealthInterop2030 to send your response. Submissions will be accepted through July 30, 2021.
