Co-Chair Mark Boxer    Co-Chair Marie Smith   Board of Directors Liaison Jeffrey Kramer Jamie Mooney		Phone: 866.466.4446    Facsimile: 860.297.3992   Email: SustiNet@ct.gov
	Post Office Box 1543 Hartford, CT 06144-1543 www.ct.gov/sustinet
	General Meeting Minutes via teleconference January 22, 2010 12:00 PM - 1:30 PM EST

 

 

Teleconference Participants:  Mark Boxer, Co-chair; Marie Smith, Co-chair; Robert Aseltine; Alex Hutchinson; Enrique Juncadella; Jeffrey Kramer; John Brady; Judith Fifield; Meg Hooper; Pam Cucinelli; Ryan O’Connell; Victor Villagra; Peter Courtway

 

Office of the Healthcare Advocate:  Michael Foy Mitchell; Africka Hinds-Ayala

 

Absent: 

 

Marie Smith opened the meeting by welcoming Committee members.  Minutes from the January 8th meeting were approved.  She said that there are seven people under consideration for Committee membership. 

 

There was a brief discussion about a retreat being planned for early February for the SustiNet Board members and Committee co-chairs.  This retreat will provide co-chairs with an opportunity to learn what other Committees and Task Forces are doing. 

 

Marie spoke of the workplan, the various sections of the plan, and who was willing to work on each one, as follows:

 

Results defined – Marie Smith, Mark Boxer
Organizational Tasks – Meg Hooper, Angelo Carraba, Ryan O’Connell, John Brady, Victor Villagra
ARRA and Federal Health Reform – Meg Hooper, Judith Fifield
Logistics – Ryan O’Connell, Alex Hutchinson, Victor Villagra
Market Research/Outreach/Enrollment – Angelo Carraba, Alex Hutchinson, Enrique Juncadella
Financing – John Brady, Meg Hooper, Victor Villagra, Enrique Juncadella
Finalizing Report – Mark Boxer, Marie Smith

 

Marie said that once workgroups have been established, the members should look at their sections for any gaps, updates or anything that needs reconsideration.  She said that each workgroup should identify a point person who will then report findings to the co-chairs.  She asked that all workgroups try to meet before the next Committee meeting so that there could be some input provided to the Committee.  Mark said that he and Marie will be conducting cross-group reviews to be sure that all components are addressed.  Marie said that HIT is a vehicle by which all the other Committee charges happen, so some of it will need to be in sync with recommendations made by other Committees.  Victor Villagra suggested that this Committee create a list of questions that other Committees have about HIT and questions that this Committee has for others, thus creating a connection to the others that all members have access to.  Michael Mitchell said that he would check to see if there could be a space on the website for this collaboration.  Jeff Kramer said that he would discuss this at the Board of Directors meeting to see if this collaboration could include all Committees and Task Forces.

 

Peter Courtway spoke of DPH HIT/HIE activities, saying that DPH was designated by the legislature for federal stimulus funding to create an advisory committee for HIT.  A key issue for this advisory committee is developing the statewide HIT plan and selecting a firm to help with implementing the plan.  Various subgroups have been formed to consider the legal aspects, how to govern the HIT exchange, the financial aspects of the exchange, and the technical domain aspects.  The plan is now being reviewed and strengthened with the goal being making it operational, but Peter said that he didn’t know how detailed the operational aspect would be.  He also said that this process is happening across the country.  Marie asked if there are any groups in CT who have applied for Beacon Community funding.  Peter said that there are three entities that he knows of that have submitted letters of intent for Beacon Communities; DPH is one, Danbury is another, and the region that surrounds the Dartmouth Atlas health referral areas is the third.  All these entities face similar challenges in the baseline criteria for the grant.  Two aspects that are troubling to all are the adoption of electronic health records for a region, with the floor to be 30% which is problematic; secondly, the size of the region that needs to be covered is quite large.

 

Marie asked about the governance of an exchange.  Meg Hooper said that the current HIT plan doesn’t require every HIT organization to plug into the same system.  She said that DPH wants to set the governance to assure compliance with certain standards such as privacy, security and compatibility.  Meg said that in the current economic situation, it isn’t realistic to ask every hospital HIE to comply with the same architecture for a statewide HIE.  It’s important that certain departments are connected to other departments, such as radiology, pharmacy and oncology, for example, before they are connected to a statewide server system.  She said that the HIT plan will be a strategic and implementational plan set by federal standards.  Meg said that estimates for a statewide HIE are 2 to 4 billion dollars, so it is essential not to override existing HIEs that are successful.  She said that DPH, as the state RHIO, will support any HIE that meets privacy, security and compatibility requirements, and is not planning to require all HIEs to be part of a statewide entity.  She also said that DPH doesn’t have a complete list of all HIEs in CT.  Additionally, Meg said that DPH only has until the end of the summer to have an implementation plan in place.

 

Peter spoke of an inventory of HIEs in the state, beginning with all the hospitals, occurring now.  He gave the following overview regarding HealthLink, which is being utilized at Danbury Hospital.
   
https://www.ct.gov/sustinet/lib/sustinet/committeeinformation/hit/healthlink_overview_for_sustinet.pdf  

 

Marie asked if pharmacists in the Danbury area have access to HealthLink records for the purpose of medication reconciliation or updating data.  Peter said that pharmacists haven’t been a part of this, but said that if it would be valuable, he and Marie can talk more about this.  Marie asked if patients would have access to their own records.  Peter said that this is under consideration and that there is a committee working on the release of records.

 

Enrique said that in addition to the technology issues being discussed, the Committee should be considering the quality and business perspectives.  Marie said that these things are important to consider for sustainability.
 
Meeting was adjourned.

 

Next meeting will be February 5, 2010 at noon.