Health IT in Wyoming
Wyoming has long envisioned bringing together all major stakeholders to participate in the development and use of a fully functional Health Information Technology system.
Wyoming’s rural geography and distance between health care providers suggests a significant need for robust Health IT. Our geography coupled with a scarcity of providers makes it difficult to deliver primary care. Evidence points to improved health outcomes, especially for those Medicaid populations requiring care for chronic illness, with enhanced delivery of primary care. Wyoming stakeholders envision a fully functional Health IT/Health Information Exchange (HIE) as an instrument to bolster the primary care workforce in the state and improve patient access to the primary care workforce.
Wyoming is approaching Health IT from several directions:
The WY e-Health Partnership is developing the plans for a state-wide health information exchange (HIE), allowing all Wyoming residents the benefits of coordinated, secure health information exchange for improved health service delivery.
Through the Medicaid Health IT plan, Wyoming Medicaid will develop a coordinated plan between Medicaid and other local, state and federal partners for interoperability with the state HIE, and including, but not limited to, ensuring privacy and security of data provided to its data exchange partners.
The HTS-Regional Extension Center assists providers and critical access hospitals with the steps necessary to install and use electronic health record systems within their practices.
Each of these partners are coordinating efforts to:
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- Identify, stratify, educate and engage providers, health industry stakeholders and advocates through a developed communication strategy.
- Develop a coordinated plan between Medicaid and the future State Office of the Health IT Coordinator for interoperability with HIE, and including, but not limited to, ensuring privacy and security of data provided to its data exchange partners. Bring about the implementation of a program that will produce by 2014 an improvement in healthcare delivery and outcomes.
- Raise public and provider awareness related to adoption, interoperability, data exchanges and system interfaces.
- Establish coordination with appropriate entities to implement, promote and facilitate the exchange of secure telemedicine/telehealth information between individuals, entities and agencies.
- Coordinate technical assistance efforts with the Regional Extension Center for eligible providers who will be negotiating with vendors, implementing project management and instituting workflow changes.
- Identify existing applications that support the build of Medicaid data for analysis and establish coordination to facilitate the exchange of information.