News from MeHI
September 2019
Baker-Polito Administration Launches
New Report on Digital Health Initiative
During remarks at the Digital Health Impact 2019 event on September 9, Governor Charlie Baker officially released the results of a new report from the Massachusetts Digital Health Council, which was tasked with advising the Governor on how to create the leading global ecosystem for digital health here in Massachusetts and to develop a three-year growth plan to achieve that goal.

The new report also tracks the progress of the Massachusetts Digital Health Initiative , the public-private effort launched in January 2016 to boost the rapidly growing sector at the intersection of healthcare and technology. MeHI is the lead public agency designated to promote and support the sector.  The report outlines eight near-term priority recommendations, the Council's activities to date, and its plans to implement the initiatives going forward. 

"There is a real energy and focus that has developed around digital health since the launch of the Initiative in 2016,” said Governor Baker. “This report provides us a blueprint to continue that progress and to further establish our global leadership in digital health.”
Medicaid Updates
Application Programming Interface (API)
In Stage 3 Meaningful Use (MU), providing patients with view, download, and transmit access is no longer sufficient to meet  Objective 5. To meet the objective, you must also provide patients with access to their health information via an Application Programming Interface (API).

Time is of the essence! The last available 90-day reporting period for 2019 begins on October 3. During attestation, you must provide documentation that your API was enabled before your MU reporting period.
If you have not already done so, contact your vendor as soon as possible to enable your system’s API, and ask for:

  • Instructions on how patients can authenticate their access to the API; and
  • List of applications that can use the API to access the information.

Then provide those documents to more than 80% of patients seen during your MU Reporting Period.
Webinar: Objective 5

Join us at Noon on   Tuesday, October 1st  for an in-depth look at meeting MU Objective 5: Patient Electronic Access.

We will address what “access” to the patient portal really means, how to track patients who decline electronic access in order to meet Measure 1 and 2 (also known as the Opt Out method), and the  API requirement -- not just what an API is, but also how the API requirement differs from the view, download, transmit (VDT) requirement.

Date:  Tuesday, October 1st
Time:   Noon-1:00pm
Reminder: 2015 Edition CEHRT
To participate in the Medicaid EHR Program for 2019, Eligible Professionals (EPs) must upgrade to the 2015 Edition of Certified EHR Technology (CEHRT) as soon as possible. The 2015 Edition CEHRT must be installed and used for the entirety of the selected 90-day EHR reporting period.

The 2015 Edition CEHRT functionality is required for EPs to meet Meaningful Use  Stage 3 requirements. If your EPs have not yet upgraded, start the process now, before it's too late. If EPs don’t upgrade to the 2015 Edition CEHRT before  October 3rd, they won’t be able to attest to Program Year 2019.

To learn more about the 2015 Edition CEHRT requirement, click  here.
Opportunities
MeHI Job Opening: Account Manager
MeHI is seeking candidates to apply for the role of Account Manager.

The Account Manager is responsible for providing HIE-focused consulting and account management services to healthcare organizations as part of a contract between the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services (EOHHS) and Mass Tech. Account Managers work with organizations to help them understand the benefits of integrating HIE into their business/clinical workflows, and provide consulting services to help them use HIE technology to support their high-value use cases.
Explore the Mass Digital Health Jobs Board
The Mass Digital Health Jobs Board  is the place to go if you are looking for a career in digital health. With nearly 2,000 posted positions from over 330 companies, it’s the only jobs board solely dedicated to digital health in Massachusetts. Plus, it’s updated daily with new openings and allows you to search for openings in 12 different fields in the digital health ecosystem.
Price is Your Right Design Challenge
Do you know any creative minds who can translate complex data into a user-friendly and easy-to-manage format?
 
This fall, MeHI is teaming up with the Massachusetts Center for Health Information and Analysis (CHIA), the Donaghue Foundation, Harvard Medical School Department of Health Care Policy, and Freedman HealthCare to host the Price is Your Right design challenge. Using actual healthcare cost data from Massachusetts and New Hampshire, contestants will design a prototype for an interactive tool that guides patients in using this information to select a medical provider. In a recent blog post , Health Affairs compared the opportunity for price transparency to the innovation explosion that occurred after NOAA opened up weather data.
 
Show us how you would help patients make better-informed decisions by designing a mobile app or website that presents cost data in an easy-to-use format. Register your team by October 5, 2019, so that the challenge coordinators can keep you up to date.
Events
Learning Collaborative on Query HIE
This fall, MeHI will host a Learning Collaborative on Query HIE, which uses the query-based exchange method to query (search) and retrieve patient information that was made accessible by other care providers. We are seeking participants from a variety of settings to offer their perspectives on Query HIE.

We will provide an overview of Query HIE and how it can be used, and discuss challenges related to issues like document types and patient consent. Out of these discussions of real world issues, we plan to create several work products designed to help guide future discussions and decisions about Query HIE.
The Learning Collaborative consists of two in-person sessions in Westborough.

Friday, October 4th
9:30am-3:00pm
and
Friday, November 8th
9:30am-3:00pm
Interested in participating? R egister here and take our optional pre-workshop survey here .
Friday, October 25th
from 9:30am-3:00pm
The Boston Chapter of Aging 2.0, together with the  Age Friendly Foundation , is pleased to announce Revolutionize.  Sponsored in part by MeHI, this inaugural event aims to revolutionize our approach to aging by promoting creative collaborations among the varied sectors engaged in aging services. Revolutionize will bring together leaders from these many sectors to reimagine and redirect the future of aging.
Mass HIway Updates
2020 Connection Requirement
For 2020, the Mass HIway Regulations (101 CMR 20.00) require all Acute Care Hospitals, all Community Health Centers, and all Large and Medium Medical Ambulatory Practices to connect to and use the Mass HIway. These organizations must meet the requirements by January 1, 2020 and must submit an attestation to the Mass HIway next summer. If a Provider Organization cannot meet the specified requirement, it must complete an Exception Form for review and consideration by the Mass HIway.
 
All organizations are required to meet the Connection Requirement by January 1, 2020 .
Acute Care Hospitals
are in Year 4 of the Connection Requirement. These orgs are subject to penalties if they do not attest next summer to meeting the Year 3 requirement (the requirements for Year 3 and Year 4 are the same).
Next summer, these organizations must submit Year 4 attestation forms.
Large CHCs and Large and Medium Medical Ambulatory Practices
are in Year 3 and must send AND receive information over the Mass HIway as part of a provider-to-provider communications use case. Next summer, these organizations must submit Year 3 attestation forms.
Small CHCs
are in Year 2 and must either send OR receive information as part of a provider-to-provider communications use case. Next summer, these organizations must submit Year 2 attestation forms.
The following resources can help your organization implement a provider-to-provider communications use case with a trading partner and be prepared to meet this requirement going forward.