Let's travel together :-). It is 2012 and the health information exchange (HIE) in Chattanooga is operational. Deep in the belly of the HIE there are documents capturing the episodes of care of various people in TN, AL or GA. John D., is among the patients with such documents. He lives in Chattanooga but regularly goes out of town for business trips. In this particular trip to Denver, CO he feels lousy and necessitates a trip to the emergency room. How does the ER doctor get the access to the health records John has in Chattanooga? The answer is Nationwide Health Information Network (NHIN). The ER doctor contacts Denver's HIE, which in turn contacts Chattanooga's HIE and retrieves John's electronic health record. All at the wire speed, all through NHIN.
On the map below, Chattanooga and Denver HIE are green hexagons. There are some other entities also represented on the map: Google Health (PHR), hospitals, labs, pharmacies, federal agencies, etc.
This is how the health information is going to flow in US. I have been involved with NHIN team since the beginning of 2009 and I can testify that this vision (started in 2004 by president Bush's administration) is moving forward.
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