eClinicalWorks Offers Self-Service Integration with CommonWell Health Alliance, Carequality

eClinicalWorks has developed a self-service module, available in its latest electronic health record (EHR) software release, that will enable customers to self-activate integration with both CommonWell Health Alliance and Carequality Interoperability Framework.

More than 400 health systems have already connected to CommonWell Health Alliance and Carequality Interoperability Framework in an effort to improve health data exchange with acute care sites across the country.

The self-activation module will enable users to select a global consent model, view available connections, and register and get connected to the Interoperability Hub, eClinicalWorks stated. Once organizations establish network links per patient, eClinicalWorks has automated the clinical data retrieval from external systems to be fetched and rendered in the Progress Note upon patient arrival. All of this can be achieved with no manual intervention from eClinicalWorks, the company stated.

"The self-service module for activating interoperability worked quite wonderfully for us," Renuka Boyapalli, M.D., an independent Endocrinologist in Torrance, California, and affiliated with multiple hospitals in the area, said in a prepared statement. “We were already live on CommonWell, but we do have some patients who go to other hospitals in the area that use Epic. We activated Carequality, and within minutes we were able to retrieve CCDAs from the University of California, Los Angeles on a few of our patients.”

Back in December 2016, as reported by Healthcare Informatics, CommonWell Health Alliance and Carequality announced connectivity and collaboration efforts in order to provide additional health data sharing options for stakeholders.

The agreement specifically outlined three core aspects:

• CommonWell will become a Carequality implementer on behalf of its members and their clients, enabling CommonWell subscribers to engage in health information exchange through directed queries with any Carequality participant.
• Carequality will work with CommonWell to make a Carequality-compliant version of the CommonWell record locator service available to any provider organization participating in Carequality.
• CommonWell and The Sequoia Project, the non-profit parent under which Carequality operates, have agreed to these initial connectivity efforts and will explore additional collaboration opportunities in the future.

In a statement about this latest news, Jitin Asnaani, executive director of CommonWell Health Alliance, said, “CommonWell Health Alliance is committed to the simple vision that health data should be available to individuals and providers regardless of where care occurs. Our person-centric services enable scalable, secure and reliable interoperability for our members and their customers across the nation. We are proud to have eClinicalWorks as a deploying member, helping to bring this vision to life.”

“One of the principles behind the founding of Carequality was that interoperability needed to be easier,” Dave Cassel, vice president of Carequality, said in a statement. “Ensuring that physicians and other providers have access to the information needed to support patient care is a huge part of our mission, but for interoperability to achieve its full potential, it also needs to be easy for those physicians to participate. We are excited that eClinicalWorks is making access to nationwide connectivity a seamless feature for their clients.”