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When You're the NFL Commish, Getting E-Medical Record Interoperability's a Cinch

Posted by Soulskill on from the it's-good-to-be-the-commish dept.

Lucas123 writes: The NFL recently completed the rollout of an electronic medical record (EMR) system and picture archiving & communication system (PACS) that allows mobile access for teams to player's health information at the swipe of a finger — radiological images, GPS tracking information, and detailed health evaluation data back to grade school. But as NFL football players are on the road a lot, often they're not being treated at hospitals or by specialists whose own EMRs are integrated with the NFL's; it's a microcosm of the industry-wide healthcare interoperability issue facing the U.S. today. The NFL, however, found achieving EMR interoperability isn't so much a technological issue as a political one, and if you have publicity on your side, it's not that difficult. NFL CIO Michelle McKenna-Doyle, who led the NFL's EMR rollout, said a call from a team owner to a hospital administrator typically does the trick. Even NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell once made the call to a hospital CEO, "and things started moving in the next couple of days," McKenna-Doyle said. "They're very aware of the publicity."

5 of 47 comments (clear)

  1. Now if only he'd deal with blatant cheating by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    My limited experience with medical records is that it isn't the hospitals that have issues interoperating, it's the vendors of the software. Try and convince them to give you access to the data in their system and they'll ask to sell you some hugely expensive component whose sole purpose is to translate their proprietary data format into a standards-compliant format. (And, again based on my limited experience, the "standard" version is so vague that you basically have to deal with every single vendor's output in a unique way anyway.)

    My experience was limited because in the end we flat-out gave up trying to get data from EMRs because we weren't the NFL and therefore didn't have the clout to make demands.

    Now if only the NFL could use their amazing abilities to rapidly get EMR interoperability to actually punish a team that's been caught repeatedly cheating and fraudulently "won" this year's Superbowl...

    1. Re:Now if only he'd deal with blatant cheating by Em+Adespoton · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Actually, the NFL could get some really good PR out of this.

      If they're able to get every hospital's EMR to work with their system (over time), then that means that their system becomes a gold-standard for interoperability.

      So if they publish the format they use, ANYBODY should be able to use that format and have the records be directly importable into any hospital system where NFL players have been seen.

      If they did this, the NFL could be seen as leaders in healthcare reform, which would definitely help their image on the healthcare front -- and might light some fires under the vendors who are abusing the system as well.

    2. Re:Now if only he'd deal with blatant cheating by Shakrai · · Score: 2

      They obviously slipped a healthy dose of stupidity into whatever refreshing beverage was being consumed by the Seahawk's Head Coach and Offensive Coordinator.

      --
      I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
      We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
  2. Those who ignore the past... by DJ+Jones · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I read TFA and the author completely misses the issue. The Clinton administration tried to implement this and congress (rightfully) voted against it. Until congress revokes the Patriot Act and proves that the Bill of Rights is still a valid contract, no informed citizen wants their medical records stored in a national archive. The privacy implications far outweigh the benefits and no amount of PCI compliance is going to ease that concern when the man-in-the-middle is tapping backbones with god damn nuclear submarines and lying to the tax payers about it. I'll stick to carrying my medical records in a banker box, thank you.

  3. I Call BS! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Disclaimer: PACS employee for state wide health system here...

    Calling Bullshit here that it's as 'easy as a call to the Hospital Administrator'. All EMR systems are not created equal, and DO NOT all play well with one another. EMR systems CAN and do fall into vendor lock in. Our system that my hospital system uses, has somewhere between half a dozen to a dozen major hospitals in the US that use it. Possilby more, but I haven't been made aware.Why mention that? Read on.

    Here's your example: The ONLY way we could do EMR sharing with an external hospital for patient PACS EMR information, is if that other hospital used the same PACS software that we use. There was a case here recently, where a hospital a few states away, DID have the same PACS package, and we were able to allow cross hospital EMR and image viewing for a patient who needed an organ transplant. Since they could view the records easily, vs. document and image faxing that it used to be... and since they had a donor for the organs, patient was transferred rapidly, and received the organs. Only made possible because of rapid access to the patients EMR and PACS.

    Point is, the software package we use, restricts us to only those hospitals who use that same package for EMR image sharing for patients. The same can be said for a lot of hospitals. It IS vendor lockin. The NFL is not immune to that.

    As for the 'NFL Commish' making a call? I'm sure he found out the nearest hospital that had the same, or a compatible, EMR and PACS systems with what the NFL uses and this is just publicity than the 'great breakthrough' of possibility with EMR & PACS in general.

    And as far as where the tech side of things is at with EMR and PACS? (This is what I do...) There aren't enough hours in the day, and enough people in my department, to bring our system into what I would call, stable, and bulletproof! We aren't there yet by miles, and are still subject to corporate bullshit and politics.