The Standard

This blog post was created through discussion over the past year among various payers, federal entities, providers, quality organizations, and HL7 staff with a focus on the importance of standardized data collection and management of race and ethnicity data. The discussion below represents a synthesis of these themes and identifies ways HL7 can help support the field.

High-quality, reliable, data are key to facilitating achievement of health equity, “the state in which everyone has a fair and just opportunity to attain their highest level of health”. This includes the collection, analysis and sharing of race and ethnicity data. However, misaligned approaches to standardized data collection present challenges to action. In addition, many organizations lack awareness of or experience challenges in applying standards when collecting and exchanging such data. In this blog, we explore existing resources that can help facilitate standardized data collection and management – HL7 is here to help.

The collection of high-quality race and ethnicity data is essential to address preventable differences - disparities - in health and healthcare. Such data are used to drive assessments, identify gaps, and the support decision-making that leads to actions to close gaps while improving outcomes. There are documented use cases by payers, providers, policymakers, and industry, for research, quality improvement and care delivery purposes. These use cases demonstrate how creating more inclusive datasets can support efforts to reduce health disparities and increase access to higher-quality care for historically marginalized communities. For example, race and ethnicity data can help provide transparency on disparate access to and uptake of services that can lead to targeted quality improvement and enhanced services for under-resourced populations. For this to occur, reliable, accurate, and consistent data are needed.

Learn about HL7's Fonteva Implementation 

Learn about HL7's Fonteva Implementation 

Dear HL7 Members and Community,

As announced last month, we are transitioning to a new Association Management System (AMS), Fonteva, enabling us to better serve the HL7 community.

As progress continues, we want to share details with you on what to expect in the coming weeks.

What to Expect During the Transition

• More details will be shared on how to submit updates/change requests during the freeze

• Membership: applications, renewals and reactivations
  • Please contact MemberInfo@HL7.org to renew/reactivate memberships prior to October 10  
• Member updates: demographics and profiles (i.e. email and address changes, etc.)
• Organization accounts: changes including key member and/or voting members
• HL7 website accounts: creation of new accounts
  • Note that other types of HL7 service accounts such as Atlassian can still be created
• Purchase of OIDS
  • Please contact MemberInfo@HL7.org prior to October 10 to purchase or wait until October 31
• Registration: events and education offerings
  • Alternative registration steps will be announced
  • Questions can be directed to Sadhana Alangar, PhD, Director of Education

HL7^® International, the global authority on interoperability of health information technology with members in 55 countries, announced election results for its board of directors, international council  and technical steering committee during its annual business meeting at the virtual 36th Annual Plenary and Working Group Meeting last week in Baltimore.

Chair-Elect

• Julia Skapik, M.D. M.P.H, chief medical information officer, National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC), was selected by the membership to serve as the chair-elect in 2023 and as the board chair, 2024-2025.

Learn about HL7's Fonteva Implementation 

Dear HL7 Members and Community:

We are pleased to share that next month we will begin the transition to a new Association Management System (AMS), Fonteva, enabling us to better serve the HL7 community. 

Fonteva Quick Facts

• Replaces the current AMS (GoMembers)
• Built on Salesforce, offering a more versatile platform
• Will not replace the current HL7.org website
  • Some sections related to membership and registrations will have a  new look and feel

HL7's Commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion

Google Cloud Platform to Work with HL7 FHIR Foundation by Providing the Underlying Cloud Technology for the HL7 FHIR Developer Community

Congratulations to the HL7 Leaders Named to Health Data Management's "20 People to Watch in Healthcare IT in 2017" 

The health IT industry publication Health Data Management released its list of the health leaders they expect to make large contributions to the discussion on HIT and provide guidance on where the industry needs to go in "20 People to Watch in Healthcare IT in 2017."