Nationwide Health Information Network (NHIN): Trial Implementations

Building upon the work in the Prototype Architectures, in September 2007, the Department of Health and Human Services awarded contracts totaling $22.5 million to nine health information exchanges (HIEs) to begin trial implementations of the Nationwide Health Information Network (NHIN), with an additional six grants totaling $600,000 added in April 2008. This collective set of information exchanges, including providers, and several Federal agencies, worked together as the NHIN Cooperative to securely exchange data including summary patient records for providers and patients. This connection of Health Information Exchanges is another key step in building a “network of networks,” the NHIN. The NHIN trial implementations leveraged the ongoing work throughout HHS and its contractors and partners, including: the Healthcare Information Technology Standards Panel (HITSP), the Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology (CCHIT), the Health Information Security and Privacy Collaboration (HISPC) and the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics (NCVHS).

The NHIN Cooperative participants include:

• CareSpark
• Cleveland Clinic Foundation
• Community Health Information Collaborative
• Delaware Health Information Network
• Department of Defense
• HealthBridge
• HealthLINC (Bloomington Hospital)
• Indian Health Service
• Indiana University (Regenstrief Institute)
• Kaiser Permanente
• Long Beach Network for Health
• Lovelace Clinic Foundation
• MedVirginia
• New York eHealth Collaborative
• North Carolina Healthcare Information and Communications Alliance, Inc.
• Social Security Administration
• Veterans Administration
• West Virginia Health Information Network
• Wright State University

Together, these organizations collaborated and achieved consensus to specify, build, and test demonstrate a core set of capabilities to enable basic exchange of health information between the different HIE networks, patients, and other stakeholders.

Core Capabilities

• Ability to look up, retrieve and securely exchange health information
• Ability to apply consumer preferences for sharing information
• Ability to apply and use the NHIN for other business capabilities as authorized by the health care consumer

The NHIN Cooperative continues its work to agree to specifications, test and demonstrate seven breakthrough use cases in December 2008, as recommended by the AHIC and accepted by the Secretary.

Once created, the NHIN Health Information Exchange (NHIE) Specifications, testing materials and trust agreements will be placed in the public domain to stimulate adoption.

Major Milestones

• June 2007 - A request for proposals for Trial Implementations was posted.
• September 28, 2007 - ONC awards contracts to 9 health information exchanges (HIEs) to begin trial implementations of the Nationwide Health Information Network (NHIN). (Press Release)
• April 2008 - ONC awards grants to six organizations to join the NHIN Cooperative. (Press Release)
• August 2008 - NHIN Cooperative completes testing of core capabilities to support the NHIN
• September 23, 2008 – ONC and NHIN Cooperative present the NHIN core capabilities to the AHIC
• December 2008 – Demonstration of core capabilities and use cases at the NHIN Forum in Washington, DC