As health IT entrepreneurs seek to innovate, they’re often stopped in their tracks by the EHR. Can they truly bring forward their creative tech solutions if they’re not able to integrate with the electronic health record?
This question will be the topic of a panel discussion at the MedCity INVEST Twin Cities conference in Minneapolis on October 11.
Hennepin Healthcare CTO Matthew Werder, who will be speaking on the panel, had a simple answer to the question. “I don’t think there are many use cases out there where a startup technology would be successful without having integration capabilities with the EMR,” he said in a phone interview.
Since the EHR is the core technology physicians use, success would simply be too difficult without EMR integration.
As health IT startups work with hospitals, Werder noted that the integration conversation needs to happen from the get-go. Organizations should be sure to evaluate a technology’s benefits against how it well it will integrate with the EHR system.
Still, the issue continues to be a problem. While the industry is still a few steps away from solving it, we have at least started to recognize it as an important challenge.
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.
“The first step of awareness is clearly there,” Werder said. “The next step will be to execute that.”
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In a separate phone interview, Sansoro Health co-founder and CMO Dr. Dave Levin, who will be moderating the panel, discussed another aspect of the equation: interoperability.
When healthcare stakeholders talk about interoperability, people typically think of records portability. But Levin argued that it’s more than that. He likened it to using applications on a smartphone. The camera app and the messaging app are seamlessly able to collaborate.
“What we’re really after is not simply records portability, but enabling a symphony of applications … to connect,” he said.
While the majority of the digital economy has migrated to using APIs (application programming interfaces) to help power interoperability, the healthcare industry is behind and relying on old legacy systems.
“It’s sort of blindingly obvious that it’s the direction we need to go as an industry is to adopt that proven technology as a core solution,” Levin said.
Will the industry ever get there or will the lack of interoperability always be an issue?
Levin is optimistic and believes it will be resolved because of how fundamental of a problem it is within the healthcare space. “We are going to solve it because we must solve it,” he said.
Photo: JamesBrey, Getty Images
