Five executives from Nashville-based hospital operators have joined the board of a new initiative advocating for “plug-and-play” hospital technology — a move that underscores the importance of integrated technology.
The Center for Medical Interoperability, which will have offices in Nashville and San Diego, will try to find ways to bridge the technological divide that plagues the sharing of information between providers and health systems. Medical interoperability would allow systems to exchange and use information rather than the current situation, where information is unable to move between incompatible systems.
The center will have a research and development lab to test and certify solutions that meet the industry’s business, clinical and technological requirements.
The center is funded by a $10 million grant from the Gary and Mary West Foundation, a foundation with a focus on lowering health care costs and senior wellness. Of the 14 board members, five work in the Nashville area.
“It is vital that all forms of health care technology, including medical devices and electronic health records, be able to seamlessly exchange information so that the quality and safety of care can be improved and costs can be reduced,” said Michael M.E. Johns, M.D., the founding chairman of the board of directors, in a prepared statement.
“The current lack of plug-and-play interoperability between medical devices, applications, enterprise systems and electronic health records hinders physicians from quickly and easily being able to access information that aids in making the best decisions for patients. It can materially compromise patient safety, and result in repeated manual entry of data and other inefficiencies that waste billions of dollars each year,” Johns said.
The board of directors:
- Michael M. E. Johns, MD, founding chairman, Center for Medical Interoperability
- Jeffrey Balser, MD, PhD vice chancellor for Health Affairs and dean, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine
- William Carpenter III, chairman and CEO, LifePoint Hospitals
- Dean Harrison president and CEO, Northwestern Memorial HealthCare
- Milton Johnson chairman and CEO, Hospital Corporation of America
- Stephen Jones president and CEO, Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital and Robert Wood Johnson Health System
- Thomas Priselac president and CEO, Cedars-Sinai Health System
- Jon Pryor, MD, MBA CEO, Hennepin Healthcare System
- Paul Rothman, MD CEO, Johns Hopkins Medicine and Dean, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
- Michael Schatzlein, MD market leader, Indiana and Tennessee Ministries, Ascension Health
- Joseph Smith, MD, PhD, chief medical and science officer, West Health Institute
- Wayne Smith Chairman, president and CEO, Community Health Systems
- Nicholas Valeriani chief executive, West Health
- Chris Van Gorder president and CEO, Scripps Health
Via The Tennessean