I frequently write here about access to health information – necessary to just-in-time decision making, tracking status in meeting health goals, coordinating care among your health team – heavily weighted to individual action and team relationships. Effective communication within your finely honed health team is necessary, but not sufficient. You and your team still needs to access and share health information from all sources to coordinate your care. Much of health information sits in electronic tools: electronic medical records (EMR), personal health records (PHR), on the web, in smart phone applications (apps), and medical devices. We can share this information in emails and in the EMR, PHR and apps. Unfortunately, the tools often don’t link. They exist in different languages, requiring expensive translators (interfaces). In industry jargon, they lack interoperability. Often tools
within one provider – a hospital, health care system, clinic needs these interfaces to work together. The problem is compounded when you see many clinicians in different systems, as I do. Multiple towers of Babel.
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