Hospital survey highlights common barriers to health information exchange

Only one in four hospitals could electronically find, send, receive and use patient care information from sources outside their health system in 2014, according to survey results released today by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology. While more than three-quarters of non-federal acute care hospitals electronically sent patient summary of care records to providers outside their health system, only 56% received such records electronically from outside sources and only four in 10 could integrate those records without manual entry. “Few hospitals used only electronic means of sending (9%) and receiving (7%) summary of care records,” the report states. “This might be due to exchange partners’ limited capability to receive information, which was considered by hospitals to be the top barrier to interoperability. Long-term care and behavioral health care providers, in particular, have limited capabilities to electronically exchange data with outside providers.” The findings are from the 2014 Information Technology Supplement to the AHA Annual Survey.