The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) and DirectTrust today announced they are collaborating to promote the universal deployment of the DirectTrust framework and health information exchange network as the standard electronic interface for health information exchange across the country.
DirectTrust’s network is the largest standards-based network for the exchange of health information, with more than 1.5 million send and receive endpoints, at over 100,000 healthcare organizations, via more than 350 ONC-certified EHRs. CHIME is the leading professional association for healthcare CIOs, with more than 2,400 members across all 50 states in the U.S. as well as 47 other countries.
Together, CHIME and DirectTrust are working to promote and ensure that secure, interoperable exchange of healthcare information via Direct exchange is available and able to be used at every location in the healthcare system where a patient’s data and information might be needed. This will include making Direct exchange universally available at hospitals, medical practices, pharmacies, labs, long-term care facilities, payers, insurers and health departments, as well as on applications.
“Our members strongly support the further development of a standards-based national platform to safely and securely exchange patient data,” said CHIME CEO and President Russell P. Branzell in a statement. “DirectTrust offers an infrastructure that goes hand in hand with our goals to assist and lead where needed to improve patient care, engage patients in their health and reduce patient safety incidents. The National Patient ID Challenge, which we launched to accurately and safely identify patients no matter what the healthcare setting, is a perfect example of these needs that require a strong national exchange infrastructure. Having these two elements in place will go far toward offering high-quality, timely patient care anytime, anywhere in the U.S. We look forward to working with DirectTrust to make this a reality.”