HIMSS will be featuring the Interoperability Showcase at McCormick Place in Chicago April 4 - 8.

This is a big step for Public Health since this will be the second year that real-time interoperability between major EMR vendors and an Immunization Registry will be demonstrated.  This interoperability will use standard communication profiles developed by Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE), and adopted by the Healthcare Information Standards Panel (HITSP). 

All communication will use messages defined in either HL7 version 2 or HL7 version 3, and will always use encrypted messages traveling over secure connections.  Secure sockets will be demonstrated for certain transactions, and web services (SOAP) will be used for others.

For more information see http://www.himssconference.org/exhibition/interop.aspx and http://www.matchmerge.com/images/stories/himss09showcasepublichealth.pdf

An article in HIMSS Healthcare IT News today discuss Personal Health Records (PHR), comparing an Integrated PHR to the stand-alone Google Health and Microsoft Healthvault PHR products.  They conclude a PHR that is integrated with a provider's internal medical record system offers advantages, but concede that the stand-alone versions may have greater initial consumer acceptance over the next 5 years.

for discussion on PHR see http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/integrated-phrs-are-way-go  

A second article in HIMSS Healthcare IT News discusses the barriers to adoption of Electronic Health Records (EHR) by providers, and states that ownership of the record is a major impediment.  They present an option of shared ownership with the patient, giving the patient financial incentives to make the record available for research.

for discussion on EHR see http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/ownership-ehrs-poises-barrier-adoption  

The California Healthcare Foundation has published an article by Forrester Consulting named "Lessons from Amazon for Health Care and Social Service Agencies" which discusses the need for SOA in Healthcare IT, and gives a simple introduction to the three base principles of SOA:

• A collection of services -- processes and data that are frequently used across the enterprise;
• A matching collection of schemas -- formats for sharing the information; and
• A matching collection of policies -- the rules that govern how the information is shared and used.
  

For the full 7-page document see http://www.chcf.org/documents/chronicdisease/ServiceOrientedArchitectureLessonsFromAmazon.pdf

Press Release from AIRA on March 27, 2009:

TO ALL AIRA MEMBERS, IIS MANAGERS, AND OTHER STAKEHOLDERS AND PARTNERS:

AIRA announces the launch of two new sections on the AIRA web site. These new pages will further the building of an IIS community of practice and provide peer-to-peer knowledge sharing and support. We hope you like what you see and continue to find the AIRA web site your go-to site for everything IIS.

TARCIIS (Technical Assistance Resource Center for IIS) -- request technical assistance, find online resources, request IIS peer support

http://www.immregistries.org/tarciis/index.phtml

IIS COMMUNITY OF PRACTICE -- blogs, wiki, forums, and committee/workgroup document sharing and communication

http://sig.immregistries.org 

Check it all out. Let us know what you think.

Thanks

Ina Kichen
AIRA

This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

According to HHS, President Obama has nominated Dr. Howard Koh, a "world-renowned public health expert" and physician to serve as the Assistant Secretary for Health.

Dr. Koh is the Harvey V. Fineberg Professor of the Practice of Public Health, Associate Dean for Public Health Practice, and Director of the Division of Public Health Practice at the Harvard School of Public Health.

At Harvard, he has served as

• the Principal Investigator of the National Cancer Institute (NCI)-funded Community Networks Program MassCONECT, a community-based initiative to eliminate cancer disparities in underserved communities;
• Principal Investigator of MassCONECT 4 KIDS, a community-based program funded by the National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities to reduce disparities in secondhand smoke exposure for children; and as
• Director of the Harvard School of Public Health Center for Public Health Preparedness (HSPH-CPHP), which promotes education about bioterrorism, pandemic influenza, and other emerging health threats.

Dr. Koh previously served as Commissioner of Public Health for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts from 1997-2003. As Commissioner, Dr. Koh led the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, which included a wide range of services, four public health hospitals, and a staff of over 3000 professionals. In this capacity, he emphasized the power of prevention and strengthened the state’s commitment to eliminating health disparities.

For commentary on the effect this appointment will have on Public Health, see

http://preventionmatters.blogspot.com/2009/03/koh-nomination-solid-choice.html