Leveraging Interoperability to Address Hospital Readmissions

Introduction

As healthcare providers face increasing pressures to lower costs and reduce readmissions, they're rapidly shifting towards accountable?care organizations (ACOs) and other coordinated, quality-based reimbursement systems. However, most providers have historically?organized their data and workflows in ways that best fi t the fee-for-service payment model. Now that so many providers are sharing?risks and rewards, they must also share and coordinate information by adopting more streamlined health information technology?solutions.

Still, the complete replacement of existing systems isn't an option for most organizations, especially those that operate within?expanding provider networks. CIOs need to control costs by retaining their existing assets, and hospitals and clinicians must keep?legacy systems running while they transition to new ones. Some of the larger health information systems feature dozens or even?hundreds of applications, many of which cannot be eliminated or consolidated. Ultimately, most healthcare organizations will need a?way to fill the informational "gaps" between existing software systems and what's needed for success in accountable care and other?quality-based reimbursement models.