Kansas Health Information Network, Inc. Is Now A Member Of The National Health Information Network, eHealth Exchange

Membership in eHealth Exchange allows KHIN members to access health information from health care providers across the nation.

Topeka, KS (PRWEB) - The Kansas Health Information Network, Inc. is pleased to announce that it is a new member of the national health information network, eHealth Exchange. KHIN is a Kansas not for profit organization with founding members that include the Kansas Medical Society and the Kansas Hospital Association. KHIN has over 800 member organizations representing Kansas hospitals, clinics, federally qualified health centers, community mental health centers, substance abuse treatment centers and others.

Membership in eHealth Exchange allows KHIN members the ability to access health information from health care providers across the nation. This helps to ensure that when Kansas patients travel outside of the state their Kansas medical records are accessible in the event of an emergency or routine care. When they return to Kansas their medical records from other eHealth Exchange facilities are available to their Kansas health care providers.

KHIN joins the already 70 participants that are exchanging critical health care information through the eHealth Exchange. The eHealth Exchange is a non-profit, public-private initiative created by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT. The participants, which include more than 1,000 hospitals and 6,000 medical groups and 60 million patients, exchange millions of transactions each year.

“We are pleased that KHIN has successfully completed the rigorous testing and security assessment process with eHealth Exchange,” said Laura McCrary Ed.D, executive director of KHIN. “One of our key reasons for joining eHealth Exchange was to share medical records with the Veterans Administration and the Department of Defense. Kansas is the home of three large military bases and over 200,000 veterans. KHIN’s connection to the VA and DOD through the eHealth Exchange will help to ensure that Kansas health care providers have important health care information available when Kansas military personnel or veterans need care.”

KHIN uses Nashville, Tennessee based ICA as its core Health Information Exchange (HIE) technology vendor. ICA is one of only two vendors to have achieved validation and this clears hurdles for ICA clients to be validated. “The fact that we can help our clients achieve validation quickly by leveraging our market-leading HIE platform is a real value. We know that widespread sharing of patient information is the way to better patient care; the fact that the eHealth Exchange is now providing a conduit to ensure standards and security are in place helps us make real strides,” said Zegiestowsky.

The connection to eHealth Exchange will also benefit Kansans who travel to other states. KHIN is already beginning the connection through eHealth Exchange to share data with Texas as many Kansas patients travel to Dallas and Amarillo for health care. The connection to eHealth Exchange also benefits Kansas hospitals and health care providers by allowing them to meet an important transition of care requirement that results in Meaningful Use incentive payments.

About KHIN
KHIN provides health information exchange services, including DIRECT messaging and query based exchange. KHIN also provides all Kansas patients a personal health record at no cost and KHIN serves as the transport layer for the Kansas public health registries. KHIN has over 800 member organizations representing hospitals, clinics, federally qualified health centers, community mental health centers, substance abuse providers and others. For more information regarding KHIN, please go to the KHIN website at http://www.khinonline.org.

About ICA
ICA’s CareAlign strategic interoperability platform delivers strategic interoperability and intelligence solutions connecting disparate healthcare enterprises. CareAlign solves data sharing and workflow challenges for healthcare organizations including hospitals, IDNs, ACOs, HIEs and payers. CareAlign leverages a wide range of information and supports the analytic needs associated with population health management, transitions of care communication, readmissions reduction, and meaningful use requirements. Our CareAlign strategic interoperability platform enables 80+ clients in more than 20 geographies spanning more than 800 organizations and 14,000 users across the continuum of care that support an estimated 12 million patients. http://www.ica-carealign.com