DirectTrust Names Health IT Stakeholders Leading Interoperability

DirectTrust has announced its third quarter selection of individuals, teams, and organizations as Interoperability Heroes in recognition of their commitment to advancing health IT.

“We're thrilled to celebrate the varied accomplishments of those working in their individual ways to advance interoperable data exchange,” Scott Stuewe, president and CEO of DirectTrust, noted in a public statement.

“Shining a light on the efforts of these individuals and teams—from a wide swath of the health information industry, including care delivery, technology, government, and advocacy—provides inspiration and a path forward to more expeditious and accurate information exchange,” he continued.

Each quarter, DirectTrust opens a window for Interoperability Hero nominations based on contribution in several categories, including organizational efficiencies, fax alternatives, collaboration with others, identity-proofing, and using Direct with other standards such as FHIR. DirectTrust recognizes entities meeting the criteria as Interoperability Heroes.

DirectTrust recognized Vaishali Patel and the data analysis team of the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) as one of quarter three’s Interoperability Heroes.

The agency’s data analysis team, which consists of informaticians, health economists, health services researchers, epidemiologists, and data scientists, has led efforts to measure national interoperability.

The team has published numerous articles, data briefs, and blogs to communicate its findings to the public and policymakers within ONC.

“Investing in measurement is critical to ensuring we understand as a health IT community where we are and how far we have to go to continue to improve,” DirectTrust representatives noted.

Another Interoperability Hero for quarter three is Didi Davis, vice president of informatics, conformance & interoperability at The Sequoia Project.

Davis formed the Data Usability/Quality Workgroup which consists of over 200 members who are working on health IT implementation guides for various data exchange use cases.

She has also convened separate workgroups of clinicians and other stakeholders to ensure feedback is documented appropriately for each specific use case. The collaborative process will ultimately result in three implementation guides. 

DirectTrust also recognized Greg Meyer, Cerner director and distinguished engineer, as a quarter three Interoperability Hero.

As vice chair of the DirectTrust Trusted Instant Messaging Plus (TIM+) Consensus Body, Meyer has helped push the industry towards a secure instant communication option.

“Most importantly, Greg has a passion for this area and has worked hard to make healthcare better using a standards based approach,” DirectTrust representatives noted.

DirectTrust also acknowledged the following individuals as Interoperability Heroes:

• James Bateman, Medchart
• Tim Freund, Banner Del E Webb Medical Center
• Louis Galterio, Suncoast RHIO
• Chip Grant, MD Watershed
• Dan Kazzaz, Secure Exchange Solutions
• Rakesh Mathew, Hike Health
• Deven McGraw, Ciitizen
• Holly Miller, MD, MedAllies
• Maria Moen, ADVault
• Dan Wilson, Moxe Health