Comagine Health Blog
Systems scientists have an adage that “everyone is right, but only partially so,” meaning that every person brings a unique perspective to a situation, but no one person can have the whole picture. This is true in health data systems as well. We have made great strides in data aggregation within health information exchanges (a tremendous benefit to personal health) and all-payer claims databases (a tremendous benefit to population health and health policy), but still, no single data source holds the whole health story both of an individual and a population. This distinction in use case(s) is important.
To benefit both personal and population health, we must integrate data across sources, time and geographies in a way that makes…
Health information exchanges (HIEs) are increasingly successful at aggregating patients’ information for providers and hospitals. The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology’s Final Rule on the 21st Century Cures Act requires HIEs to allow patients to have access to all their data at no cost. The Delaware Health Information Network has already built a patient portal called Health Check Connect. Now is time for all HIEs to do the same.
Patients stand to…
As much as the practicing medical community recoils at the thought of prior authorization (PA), the need to address inappropriate and unnecessary medical care remains paramount. In 2012, Berwick and Hackbarth estimated the cost to society of overtreatment to be between $158 billion and $226 billion. A 2019 update to this estimate approximated the cost of overtreatment or low-value care to be between $75.7 billion and $101.2 billion. (The latter study used more conservative cost assumptions…