It seems that everywhere you look someone is talking about HIE or claiming to have an HIE product. But is there widespread adoption, and for it’s intended use? HITECH requires that the provider market invest in HIE, but how do you ensure that you protect your investment from all the hype. In the short term the answer may be enterprise HIE.
HIE takes a relatively large investment in time and money to deploy. How do you ensure success and return on your investment when the market is still in a state of flux and no clear direction has been defined. There is still no clear direction from the state and or regional HIE’s. If you are a multi location and or care setting provider the answer is probably enterprise HIE.
Enterprise HIE is similar to stand alone HIE, except that the focus of enterprise HIE is information exchange across your own enterprise. Even if the true HIE vision is never realized, Enterprise HIE will still provide a great deal of value. And if HIE eventually takes off, you will be in a great position to begin sharing information externally as well as internally.
Healthcare IT News in an article on May 25, 2010 (http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/enterprise-hie-market-poised-soar) states that the Enterprise HIE market is poised to soar, and I tend to agree. This will be the path forward for most organizations while the HIE market figures itself out.
What is everyone else seeing in the market? Please share your thoughts.
