On why FHIR changes things for one developer outside of healthcare: “THAT I can work with. I look at it and it’s a language I can read; it’s something that I’m happy to build to, because it makes complete sense with the way I’ve been doing internet technology in other sectors.”
On why those outside healthcare start with patient facing apps: “They seem to approach it from the patient perspective, in part because they are not working from the inside out, so that’s their point of access in the healthcare system.”
On predictions around production timing: “I think we’ll start to see that as people get certified to meet a particular use case related to a consumer-facing API, we’ll put more and more specific things into production, maybe later this year and certainly in 2017. There’s increasing demand that I’m always surprised by.
On the Argonaut Project: “We have a growing an implementation community, which is 90+ organization who have enrolled in the implementation community. I don’t want to pretend that we have 90 active participants every week. That’s the reality of these kinds of things — there’s a lot of interest and participation at different levels, according to what their needs are.”
“The whole purpose of the Argonaut Project was to say let’s take the work that is being done at the standards level and see what we can do to accelerate a subset of the broader FHIR that’s being developed through the standards development organization HL7.”
On what FHIR won’t solve: “The things that [FHIR] won’t solve is disincentives or lack of incentives that exist in the market for exchanging information in the first place. It doesn’t solve any of those things.”
On whether FHIR will replace HL7 version 2: “One thing I can say with confidence is even if it does, it’s going to be a very long transition process. I think we’ll have version 2 point-to-point interface transactions in place for a long time, in part because they are pretty rock solid and they work, and they are in place today. It’s the classic “if it’s not broken, don’t fix it.”
On the key stakeholder who might put patient-generated data to use: “Everyone wants to upload their FitBit data somewhere and they are discovering that their doctors really don’t want it. What if CVS said, ‘Send your FitBit stuff to me. I have a team of epidemiologist and others and fancy algorithms that will do a lot of the signal-to-noise analysis and you tell us who your PCP is and we will tell your PCP when we see something that they should be concerned about.’ And then patients trust CVS even more and they are tied in even more with CVS.”
If this podcast leaves you wondering about this new data standard, learn more about FHIR here in less time than a coffee break.
Today's Guest
President and CEO, Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative
Micky Tripathi is the founding President and CEO of the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative. His activities range from policy guidance at the federal level, to collaborative strategic planning at the state and community levels, to implementation of health IT systems at the frontline of healthcare delivery.
Micky Tripathi is the founding President and CEO of the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative. His activities range from policy guidance at the federal level, to collaborative strategic planning at the state and community levels, to implementation of health IT systems at the frontline of healthcare delivery.
Prior to leading MAeHC, Micky worked with U.S. and international clients as a Manager at the Boston Consulting Group, a leading strategy and management consulting firm. While at BCG, he served as the founding president and CEO of the Indiana Health Information Exchange, where he led the design and launch of one of the largest and most successful statewide laboratory results-delivery businesses in the country. Micky serves on a number of boards and steering committees, including the Argonaut Project, HL7 Advisory Council, the Board of Directors of the Sequoia Project, and previously served as the Chair of the eHealth Initiative Board of Directors.
Micky holds a Doctorate of Philosophy in Political Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a Masters in Public Policy from Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government, and a Bachelor’s in Political Science from Vassar College.
Our Interviewer
Co-founder & Chief Technology Officer
As CTO, Travis leads Datica’s engineering team. His background in compliance, security, and cloud infrastructure gives him technical expertise that, when paired with his experiences as an MD, allows for a unique view on the challenges of healthcare.