Health IT exec on 'trial' nationwide networks

12.12.2006
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced Friday that it will support trial projects that could lead to an operating nationwide health information network (NHIN). John Loonsk, director for interoperability and standards in HHS's Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, recently talked about how the trials will work and how HHS will, for the first time, work directly with local and state health information exchange groups to build an NHIN.

Excerpts from the conversation follow:

What are the goals of the NHIN trials, and how will these trials work? This year, the NHIN initiative includes contracting with four consortia, each of which has three health care markets associated with it. The goal this year was to develop prototype architectures. That work will culminate in January with the presentation of these prototype architectures. The next year's work, which we're terming "trial implementations" is taking the next step toward getting to a production network of networks, which will be what the NHIN is. We're trying to get the kind of technical expertise that the consortia developed ... together with state and regional information exchanges to work to knit together these different exchanges into an NHIN. It is the next step toward a production [version] of an NHIN.

Have you determined how state and local health information exchanges already in existence will participate in the trials? This year's work was with technology companies. ... We anticipate that this next step will directly engage the state and regional health exchanges, and we will ask them to make sure they have partnered with a technology partner. We are pleased with the work of the four prototypes this year and think they will figure prominently in the next step.

What entities and geographic regions will be involved, and what exactly will they be doing as far as exchanging health data? It is too early to know which ones or how many. We do not know what the budget will be for the NHIN for next year, and that will factor into the equation. This will be an open request for proposals. We would anticipate the awards being made in the spring.

Have you determined the cost for these trials? It is too early for that. We have to go through the procurement process.