The Southeast Michigan Beacon Community (SEMBC) Health Information Exchange referred to as BeaconLink2Health is an all new community resource for the entire healthcare delivery system in Southeast Michigan. BeaconLink2Health makes it possible for users to access, view, understand, and act on community-level patient information via a secure HIE.
The Michigan exchange offers a variety of care coordination tools, evidence-based care gaps, alerts, plus other features that are available at the point-of-care such as:
- The Clinical Data Repository offers providers a community view of all available patient-related data and allows for tracking and management of multiple chronic conditions from a single view that displays key care action items
- The Visit Planner is a point-of-care reference for an individual patient’s set of conditions and measures. It assists the provider in treating both acute and chronic conditions with immediate access to actionable items based on the latest information and updates
- Population Health Management tools enable the timely delivery of care, patient outreach, quality improvement and reporting that satisfies the auditing and clinical quality requirements of a number of payer incentive models
BeaconLink2Health HIE has successfully established and tested ambulatory care connections to the Michigan Care Improvement Registry (MCIR) to help participating providers better manage, access, and submit electronic immunization records to the state.
In the past, providers recorded immunization information by logging on to a MCIR web portal and then entering the same immunization information to their EHRs. Today, providers can link to the Exchange, immunizations are entered into their EHRs, and then automatically transmitted to MCIR eliminating the need for duplicate entry.
In addition, other public health HIE systems in the state such as the Michigan Health Alert Network sends out emergency alerts. The Michigan Disease Surveillance System with 950 active uses, and the Emergency Department Syndromic Surveillance System now in place are able to help public health agencies spot potential outbreaks more quickly.
The Michigan Health Information Technology Commission is an advisory committee to the Michigan Department of Community Health. At their recent meeting, the committee discussed the state’s progress in developing a Chronic Disease Registry (CDR). CDR is in Phase 1 and the committee is going to further discuss how to enable birth defects to be reported to the CDR.
The Michigan Healthcare Cyber-security Council being established includes Healthcare CIOs, CSOs, and thought leaders in HIT Cyber-security. The Council was convened through an action from the Governor’s office.
The first meeting was held mid-June with 17 hospitals, 2 health plans, Department of Technology Management and Budget (DTMB), Michigan Health Information Network (MiHIN), and the Michigan Health and Hospital Association (MHA) in attendance.
In July, a second meeting was held where 15 hospitals, 3 health plans DTMB, Michigan Department of Community Health (MDCH), and MiHIN participated and initiated three working groups.
These groups discussed medical devices, how to develop a common security framework comprised of multiple standards, and how to develop best practices for incident management and notification.