Erica Galvez, who led development of the federal government’s Shared Nationwide Interoperability Roadmap, has rejoined a former boss in the private sector.
Galvez, who had been interoperability program manager in the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, now is director of health information exchange for Aledade. That Bethesda, Maryland-based startup company, which supports physician-led Accountable Care Organizations, is run by ex-national health IT coordinator Dr. Farzad Mostashari.
Galvez announced her appointment Monday in a post on Aledade’s blog. She had been on maternity leave from ONC since August, though she returned briefly last month to help the agency release the final version of the roadmap.
“Accountable care is a huge motivator for interoperability,” Galvez said in an interview with MedCity News. Likewise, she added, interoperability is “fundamental” to making ACOs work because each participant in a given patient’s care needs access to data from others.
Initially, Galvez will be focusing on making sure that Aledade clients receive admission, discharge and transfer notices whenever patients go into, leave or move to different care sites. She eventually will move on to deeper information exchange, but this is an important building block.
“ADT is a key, foundational piece we have to lay for accountable care,” Galvez said. “It’s very actionable, but it’s a very narrow slice.”
Now that the roadmap is out, Galvez hopes to follow the document she was such an integral part of. “There’s only so much the federal government can do in this space and there’s only so much ONC can do,” she said. “The bulk of the work to be done now is in the private sector.”
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
There are, of course, so many barriers to full interoperability and so many questions to be addressed: Who pays for moving data around? What standards should be followed? What is the scope of data use allowed in each type of transaction? “I think the challenge lies more on the people and policy side than on the technology side,” Galvez said.
The move away from fee-for-service reimbursement toward alternative payment models gives Galvez reason for optimism. “That’s exactly what attracted me to the accountable care model,” she said.
