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Note: Catholic Health Initiatives' HIE will span 19 states, participating in community and national exchanges.
8 Health Information Exchanges Lead The Way (click image for larger for slideshow) Catholic Health Initiatives (CHI), the nation's second largest Catholic healthcare system, has launched a three-year project to build an enterprise-wide health information exchange (HIE) with the help of HIE vendor Orion Health.
CHI is currently rolling out and upgrading electronic health records (EHRs) in its 76 acute-care hospitals and more than 300 ambulatory care clinics in 19 states; it's also contemplating adding clinical information systems in its 40 long-term care (LTC) and assisted-living facilities and other provider sites. Michael O'Rourke, senior VP and CIO of CHI, told Information Week Healthcare that the Englewood, Colo.-based chain has completed about 25% of its EHR implementation in hospitals and physician practices. CHI won't start up local HIEs, he said, until those systems have gone live in each market.
While it appears that Orion will be helping CHI build a single, gigantic HIE stretching across the country, O'Rourke said that represents only the "architecture" of the project,...