eHealth Exchange

The Sequoia Project’s CEO Keynotes IHE World Summit in Amsterdam

Shares Key Lessons and European Parallels in Developing eHealth Exchange Network

(Amsterdam, Netherlands – June 7, 2016) – The key to building the eHealth Exchange, the largest data sharing network of its kind in the United States, is industry and government collaboration and continual testing, according to Mariann Yeager, CEO of The Sequoia Project, who keynoted today’s IHE World Summit. Ms. Yeager shared lessons learned and drew parallels of the federated structure for the eHealth Exchange for an audience of public and private sector healthcare leaders from across Europe.

“Collaboration of industry and government is critical to successful, cross-boundary health data sharing,” said Ms. Yeager. “Today’s healthcare IT Interoperability in the U.S. is a result of customer demand and the Federal government’s push for a uniform approach.”

The IHE World Summit is held in parallel to eHealth Week in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The Summit brings together healthcare IT system users and developers to address interoperability issues that impact clinical care worldwide. Ms. Yeager’s keynote presentation provided insights into the challenges and benefits of a government sponsored pilot driven by industry supported policies and IHE-based technical standards for health data sharing.

The eHealth Exchange network was initially incubated by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and transitioned to function as a public private collaborative initiative, supported by The Sequoia Project, in 2012. Under The Sequioa Project’s stewardship, the network more than quadrupled in connectivity since 2012. Current eHealth Exchange participants include large health systems, hospitals, pharmacies, regional health data sharing networks and four US federal agencies, representing nearly 1/2 of all U.S. hospitals, tens of thousands of medical groups, more than 8,000 pharmacies and 100 million patients.

“In order to scale to nationwide connectivity across the US, and enable interoperable data sharing across diverse geographies and technology platforms, the eHealth Exchange established a rigorous program,” said Ms. Yeager. “We are now seeing the fruits of that labor, with onboarding reduced from months to just a few weeks.”

Download The Sequoia Project’s IHE World Summit Keynote.

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About eHealth Exchange

The eHealth Exchange, a 501(c)3 non-profit, is among the oldest and largest health information networks in America and is most well-known as the principal way the federal government shares data between agencies and with the private sector. The eHealth Exchange, a network of networks, is the only network connecting healthcare providers to five federal agencies, 64 regional or state HIEs, 75 percent of all U.S. hospitals, and 85 percent of dialysis clinics running on more than 30 electronic health record (EHR) platforms. National interoperability is facilitated by one common trust agreement and a single set of APIs. Five federal agencies (Department of Veterans Affairs, Department of Defense, Indian Health Service (IHS), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and Social Security Administration) participate in the network to share patient information with private-sector healthcare partners as well as other agencies. The eHealth Exchange supports the secure exchange of the more than 12 billion patient record transactions annually. 

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