Hospitals work together to share patient information

What spans 39 Michigan counties, covers 2.2 million people, and assists more than 3,500 providers?

This year, Lakeland Health System, Metro Health, Northern Michigan Regional Health System, Spectrum Health, and Trinity Health took the patients-come-first mantra one step further to create Michigan Health Connect (MHC), based in Grand Rapids. It acts as a hub for exchanging clinical information electronically about patients -– and it's been done with no federal or state grant funding.

Megan Yore, of Lakeland HealthCare says, "MHC has the goal of creating a seamless, high-quality experience for patients as they access health care throughout the state."

With this partnership in place, testing results, laboratory and radiology ordering, electronic health records, and reference labs are available to more than 460 physician practices and community hospitals. Say goodbye to fax machines and hello to administrative savings, improved clinical attention, and enhanced overall patient care.

"This has been a bottom-up approach," says Doug Dietzman, executive director of MHC. "We've collaborated, aligned the systems' respective interests and business needs, made the commitment to not compete on clinical data exchange, and leveraged our collective existing technology and funding. We knew this made sense for our area and for our patients."

MHC also will continue a collaboration with the State of Michigan on various initiatives and pilot projects to build sustainability, increase efficiency in state-wide transactions, and closely align with federal Nationwide Health Information Network (NHIN) requirements.

"Launching MHC shows how organizations can control their own destinies and shape how they want a health information exchange to work for the benefit of the individual entities, the community overall, and most importantly the patient," says Doug Fenbert, division director, Trinity Health and MHC board member.

Writer: Stacie Carlson
Source: Megan Yore, Lakeland HealthCare