Newswise — NYU Medical Center was recently awarded a $300,000 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to begin the planning phase of a regional health information network in the New York City area. The grant is part of a National Library of Medicine sponsored program called Integrated Advanced Information Systems (IAIMS). Known as NYCLIX (for "New York Clinical Information Exchange" ), the network will allow Emergency Department (ED) physicians access to clinical background information on patients who may have previously been treated in other participating hospitals. The project encompasses 14 local hospitals.
Imagine, as a usual patient of NYU Medical Center, that you find yourself, confused and disoriented, in the emergency department of another hospital in the city. How much more quickly and safely could you be treated if the receiving hospital knew your medical history? Devising a system that could accomplish just that is the goal of NYCLIX, an outgrowth of the IT subcommittee of the Greater New York Hospital Association, to establish a regional health information network in the New York City area. The immediate aim is to allow ED doctors to securely search, in Google-like fashion, for clinical background information on patients who may have previously been treated in another of the 14 participating hospitals.
"This award will be used to fund the planning phase of the project which entails defining the types of clinical data that should be exchanged, designing a technical blueprint of how to transmit and access it securely, and creating an organization to oversee the privacy, financial, and governance issues involved," explains Mark Lipton, MD, Director of Clinical Infomatics at NYU Medical Center and Vice Chair of the Board of NYCLIX.
Studies show that as many as one-third of all ED visits are to institutions other than the patient's primary hospital. Correspondingly, other studies have revealed information gaps in one out of every three ED visits and even higher rates for sicker patients. Nearly half the time, the missing links are deemed "essential to care."
Apply those findings to the ED patient volumes"close to 900,000 visits a year in Manhattan, 95 percent of them to NYCLIX institutions—and one can gauge the potential. Improving the quality and speed of emergency care is only the starting point. Ultimately, the network could also link ambulatory clinics and doctors' offices, as well as becoming part of the National Health Information Network. This will help physicians provide optimal care by providing key information at the time care is being given. Having information will guide physicians ordering tests, helping keep down the costs of care by avoiding duplicate diagnostic tests. For New York State as a whole, the savings could reach $4.54 billion a year as well as improving patient outcomes and saving lives.
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