During her trip to HIMSS19, Center for Medicare & Medicaid Service administrator Seema Verma spoke with registered members of the media to preview her keynote speech and answer questions about her department’s newly released proposed interoperability rule. The rule dictates that data generated by patients while in the scare setting is theirs to own, transfer and share with caregivers. It also would require healthcare providers and plans to implement open data sharing technologies to support transitions of care as patients move between these plan types.
In a statement released prior to her meeting with the media, Verma said that ensuring patients have easy access to their information, and allowing that information to follow them on their healthcare journey “can reduce burden, and eliminate redundant procedures and testing, thus giving clinicians the time to focus on improving care coordination and, ultimately, health outcomes.”
During her meeting with the media at HIMSS, Verma started by discussing CMS’ “why” — why CMS is moving toward enhanced patient empowerment – as well as her and the administration’s focus on the improving the sustainability of the healthcare community.
Patient empowerment remains front and center for the agency, she said. For example, from the patient perspective, everyone has their own experience of going to the healthcare system and not being an empowered patient, she said, and not having access to data decreases patient engagement. CMS is working to change that, now.
When people understand their health and participate in their health, this has the ability to improve care outcomes, she added, and through complete access to their healthcare records, patient care can be more complete. Ultimately, she said, with every detail of a person’s health information in one place — and accessible to the patient — will kick start the digital health data revolution.
Matthew Fisher, attorney at Mirick O’Connell, a Massachusetts-based law firm, spoke to Electronic Health Reporter during HIMSS19, following the release of a new proposed rule by HHS. The proposed rule outlines potential sanctions and penalties placed upon healthcare organizations and physicians that keep information from patients, known as information blocking.
In her explanation of the rule, Administrator Seema Verma took a strong tone in supporting patient access to their health information and ownership of patient data. “One thing that I want to make very clear for the entire healthcare system is that the data belongs to the patient. It’s their data. It doesn’t belong to the provider. It doesn’t belong to the EHR company. It belongs the patient.”
Based on these sentiments and the proposed rule, here Fisher speaks about what it ultimately may define, and its potential impact on providers and healthcare organizations. Listen to our full conversation here:
Following the release of its proposed new rules designed to improve the interoperability of electronic health information, members of leadership from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) hosted a call to provide additional detail about the proposed rule, and to answer questions from the media. The following includes the key takeaways from the officials hosting the call.
Seema Verma
Seema Verma, Administrator, CMS
CMS shares a commitment with patients to obtain and share their health data.
The proposed rules ensure patients have access to their records in digital format.
We are “unleashing” data for research and innovation while tackling what might be the greatest healthcare challenge in our history, including the potential upcoming healthcare cost crisis that could destroy the US economy.
MyHealthEData unleashes innovation and focuses on results.
CMS is doubling down by requiring health plans to release claims data. All health plans in Medicare, Medicaid and that have plans within the federal exchange must allow for information be shared so patients can take their records with them when they move on.
Through these efforts, more than 125 million patients will have access to health information and be able to take information with them.
We are putting an end to information blocking and will publically identify doctors, hospitals and others who engage in information blocking.
Patient data doesn’t belong to doctor, but to the patient.
We’re putting the patient at the center of healthcare data. The time of keeping patients in the dark to trap them in systems so that they can never leave are over.
We are empowering patients to understand their healthcare information.
This rule allows patients to aggregate their data in one place through APIs/apps – putting the data in one place to help them understand it. They can organize the information, create care reminders, take data for the next provider when they go to a new provider.
This allows for aggregation of data in one place; physicians no long need to duplicate tests, for example.
Patients can donate their data for research, if they so desire, possibly opening up new wave of innovation of development.
Don Rucker
Don Rucker, MD, National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC)
Through this rule, ONC has put the technical underpinnings asked for in the 21st Century Cures Act.
Provisions have been made for security and privacy for patients.
Information blocking has not be enforceable until now.
Interoperability is technically there, but pricing strategies were not effective, but this proposed rule changes that.
This strikes a role for transparency – and helps lead toward providing information about what patients are buying and they are getting for a certain cost.
Getting transparency in pricing is very complicated, primarily because of decades of previous regulation.
Eric D. Hargan
Eric Hargan, deputy secretary, HHS Office of the Secretary
These proposals contain a number of historic measures designed so that individual patients can securely access their health records.
We believe empowering patients with this access will build an ecosystem that improves individual care and provides access to healthcare.
This also should reduce the burden on providers.
We can’t built a vale-based healthcare system with these rules.
Thank you Jared (Kushner) for that kind introduction. It has been an honor to work alongside visionaries like you; somebody who really understands at a very personal level as I do, the need and potential of innovation to better serve Americans. Having the Office of American Innovation involved is critical, and I’m grateful for Jared’s involvement, his hard work, and his leadership. It’s an honor to serve with him, and I am grateful for his service to our country.
It is a privilege to be with you here today and speak about the amazing advancements happening all across the nation in healthcare. One of the most exciting parts about being the CMS Administrator is the opportunity to see the cutting-edge breakthroughs that are happening every day. As we walk the exhibit hall of this conference, it is easy to be struck by how innovation is accelerating in healthcare.
We have procedures that we couldn’t have imagined a generation ago that are saving thousands of lives.
Precision medicine has opened the door to a new world of therapies specifically tailored to a patient’s unique genetic code.
We can now treat retinal disease that causes blindness.
Robotic technology is making surgeries less invasive, and we are on the verge of having the world’s first artificial pancreas.
3D training tools are enabling doctors to learn anatomy without a cadaver.
Telemedicine is also improving access to care and empowering CMS beneficiaries to lead healthier lives.
And it doesn’t stop with traditional healthcare innovators. The automobile industry is partnering with leading technology companies to perfect driver-less cars that may one day give independence to our nation’s elderly and people with disabilities. And through smart phones and wear-able technology, we are compiling health information every second, and Americans are using that information to track activity, calories, and heart rates. Innovators are even developing ways to monitor chronic illness with electronic watches. The list of innovation is endless.
But while all of this technology is changing every area of our lives, we face enormous challenges in healthcare, and the value that we are receiving for the amount of money that is being spent.
Last year CMS released a report showing that the rate of growth in healthcare spending is not slowing down. Despite all of the changes and regulations over the past decade, healthcare continues to grow more quickly than the overall economy. By 2026, we will be spending one in every $5 on healthcare.
This matters to each and every one of us because this increase in spending will continue to crowd out funding for other priorities, such as roads and schools, as well as national defense. Not to mention it means higher healthcare spending for each and every one of us. We’ve already seen our costs go up, with health insurance premiums, co-pays and deductibles.
And yet, this national increase in spending has not addressed many of America’s healthcare challenges. Entire communities have been ravaged by the opioid epidemic, and we rank poorly compared to other countries when it comes to preventing premature births, infant mortality and chronic diseases. It’s clear that when it comes to the most consequential measures of health and wellness, we need to get much more for our money.
The system we have is unsustainable, and it cannot continue. And President Trump agrees.
Last year, the President announced an Executive Order: Promoting Healthcare Choice and Competition Across the United States. Through his executive order the President made clear that he wants his administration working to change the rate of growth of healthcare spending so that competition can be fostered in healthcare markets, so that patients, and the American people, may receive better value for our investment in healthcare.
Secretary Azar and I are working for competition and better value by moving away from a fee-for-service approach, to a system that is value-based – and that rewards value over volume. This means paying providers on the outcomes they achieve, making people healthier rather than how many procedures they perform. Now many of you have heard this all before.
But, I’ve always been struck by how seldom the patient is mentioned in discussions around value-based care. Let me be clear, we will not achieve value-based care until we put the patient at the center of our healthcare system. Until patients can make their own decisions based on quality and value health care costs will continue to grow at an unsustainable rate. This administration is dedicated to putting patients first, to be empowered consumers of health care that have the information they need to be engaged and active decision-makers in their care. Through this empowerment, there will be a competitive advantage for providers that deliver coordinated, quality care, at the best value, to attract patients who are shopping for value.
I have spent a lot of time talking to Americans from all walks of life, and they are demanding more accountability from the health care system. As they are paying more through higher premiums and higher deductibles, they want to know how much services are going to cost, and they want to shop around for the best price. They don’t want to be paying for duplicate tests, or unnecessary care, and they are demanding a higher level of service and efficiency from the healthcare system.
In every other area of our lives, we are receiving better services that leverage innovation in technology. We can take our ATM card to any bank across the globe, and that bank can access our accounts. We can track every credit card purchase, and every phone carrier honors our cell phone number, and we receive ads for products we were only thinking about buying – or so it may seem.
So it should be no surprise that Americans have the same consumer friendly demands for healthcare. Americans are demanding that when they go to the doctor, the doctor spends more time with them, and less time on paperwork or typing into a computer.
To that end, in our drive towards value-based care, CMS adopted an approach that we call “Patients Over Paperwork.” Patients Over Paperwork is a direct result of President Trump’s Cut the Red Tape initiative, which aims to restore patients as the priority of everything we do, and eliminate burdensome regulations that have outlived their purpose.
We have held meetings in cities across America, and received thousands of letters. And one of the most common complaints we have heard from both patients and providers has been the inefficiency of Electronic Health Records – or EHRs, and the inability of providers to effectively coordinate care for their patients.
Now tremendous progress has been made in the adoption of EHRs. The technology for data sharing has advanced, and data is often shared effectively within a given healthcare system, with inpatient and outpatient doctors in the same provider system able to share and edit the same clinical record.
Despite this progress, it is extremely rare for different provider systems to be able to share data. In most cases there is not yet a business case for doing that – it’s in the financial interest of the provider systems to hold on to the data for their patients.
