Martinez emphasizes that while the dollars certainly help, it takes more than funding to create a connected care network. “It's about common goals, and it's about trust,” he says. “What we'Re doing is bringing together payers, providers, patients and hospital systems - entities that have never had trust in each other in the past - and working together to try to do this. We'Re very proud of the work we'Re doing.”
‘Big concern’
Although New York appears to be headed down the right path, it still has a long way to go in terms of establishing a true statewide connected care network. The reason is simple: “HIEs are very, very difficult,” says KLAS’ Hess.
In the 2010 HIE Performance Report, KLAS found that providers and administrators had many concerns about HIEs, including privacy and security, patient consent, financial viability, a lack of data standards, uncertainty about funding from the ARRA-Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act, and physician adoption. “There's a lot of cynicism,” Hess says, noting that when participants have been asked if they were worried about future funding, 56 percent answered yes. “If you've got this thing up and running and you'Re concerned that it might not be viable in the future, this is a big concern,” he notes.
What's adding fuel to the fire, Hess says, is the fact that such a large number of vendors seem to be entering the HIE space. “Some vendors are following the money trail to HIE, and it's making it difficult to navigate what's true and what's not.” Since KLAS’ report was published in February 2010, more than two dozen additional vendors have staked claim in the HIE space.
“The market for HIEs is a mile wide and an inch deep. It's poised for explosive growth,” says Hess. And although there are almost 50 vendors vying for business in the space, he expects to see a great deal of consolidation in the next few years as leaders emerge. “It's going to be a very competitive and very difficult space.”
Healthcare Informatics 2010 July;27(7):14-16
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