HIEs will allow physicians to exchange patient treatment data, prescriptions and radiological images such as X-rays, with other medical facilities. Standardizing data transfer protocols will allow that information to be exchanged with non-affiliated facilities. For example, a specialist from a cancer treatment center could share test results with a patient's primary care physician in a different hospital network or different part of the country.

With regard to helping to build state-level HIEs, the ONC will focus on standards for electronic prescriptions, the exchange of patient care summaries, lab test results, public health statistics reporting, and overall patient engagement in healthcare.

Williams said the ONC recognizes that "every state is different, so there cannot be a cookie cutter approach."

"You'll see a wide variety strategies ... depending on what's already in place in a state. We're focusing our efforts on the certification part of it. It's not that we want to be the builder. What we want to do is have the standards, the policy and the services that we're enabling through our regulations and through our standards work," she said. Williams explained that the government will also be consulting with the private sector to establish the "building block" needed to create cheap yet valuable exchanges.

"We think of exchange and interoperability as a journey and not a destination. We're not going to be done this year. We're not going to be done next year, but we're going to be continually evolving," Williams said. "We're going to be moving quickly into a world where care coordination and care management [are] across [a network] that's distributed."