East Lansing, MI, September 22, 2011 — Michigan Health Information Network Shared Services (MiHIN), the state designated health information exchange (HIE) for Michigan, today announced engagement of OptumInsight and its Axolotl HIE platform to implement Phase One of the MiHIN Strategic and Operational Plan.
“This is a very exciting stage for health information exchange in Michigan. Our state has been a leader in promoting the pervasive distribution of qualified sub-state organizations capable of supporting secure data exchange among emergency departments, hospitals, physician offices, and other health care settings across Michigan’s 83 counties. MiHIN’s work will now create that focal point for integration that ties each of these regional or sub-state efforts together and offers a seamless gateway with the State of Michigan; eventually MiHIN shall function as an official node on the Nationwide Health Information Network,” said Tim Pletcher, MiHIN Executive Director.
“The Axolotl HIE platform enables both a direct connection and “light weight services” backbone for MiHIN, connecting qualified organizations to establish Michigan’s statewide network. With our tools and capabilities, MiHIN will be able to interoperate with other HIEs via NwHIN protocols, and support Direct Project protocols for point to point health information exchange,” said Glenn Keet, President, Axolotl, now OptumInsight. “We look forward to working with MiHIN and to play an important role towards establishing successful health information exchange in Michigan.”
The MiHIN Phase One initial activities focus on streamlining public health reporting for immunizations, disease surveillance and set the stage for exchange of structured data such as care summaries to support transitions of care. In response to the new OptumInsight HIE infrastructure , pharmacist Larry Wagenecth, Executive Director for the Michigan Pharmacy Association, Chair of the MiHIN Board of Directors, and Michigan Health Information Technology Commissioner stated, “State wide infrastructure for timely and better quality information exchange not only enables providers to demonstrate meaningful use of health information technology, but creates tangible opportunities for increasing patient safety, efficiency gains to reduce costs, and leads to an overall improvement in population health.”
The selection was based on the recommendation of a MiHIN RFP committee formed last spring comprised of a multi-stakeholder group of veteran health information technology and health exchange experts across Michigan chaired by Richard Warren, Vice President of Information Services & Chief Information Officer at Allegiance Health and MiHIN Board Member. “The volunteer RFP selection team spent hundreds of hours to insure that the people of Michigan have the best available technology infrastructure for the private and secure exchange of health information. Getting physicians and other clinicians the right information at the right time at the point of care will be a key component to better care and healthier lives for all the people of Michigan in the future. This is a big step in the right direction!” offered Mr. Warren.
About the Michigan Health Information Network
The Michigan Health Information Network (MiHIN) Shared Services is a public and private nonprofit collaboration dedicated to improving the healthcare experience, improving quality and decreasing cost for Michigan’s people by supporting the statewide exchange of health information and making valuable data available at the point of care.
The MiHIN Shared Services was created in December 2010 to administer the technical and business operations of Michigan’s State HIE Cooperative Agreement program created by the Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) for Health Information Technology and functions as the state designated health information exchange (HIE) for Michigan. The MiHIN Shared Services is a collaboration between Michigan’s sub-state Health Information Exchanges (HIEs), Michigan’s insurer community and the state of Michigan government.
- See www.mihin.org
- EMAIL Inquiries To:info@mihin.org
About Axolotl, now OptumInsight
Axolotl, now OptumInsight, part of Optum – a leading health services business has been providing products and services for secure health information exchange and management since 1995. Powering HIE for thousands of health care entities – including hospitals, health systems, regional health information organizations (RHIOs/HIEs), ACOs, clinics, laboratories, radiology centers and physician practices-they are reducing health care costs, eliminating redundancy and improving quality and efficiency.
Axolotl’s SOA platform, Master Patient Index, EdgeServer(s), Interoperability HubTM (I-HUB), Community Virtual Health Record (VHR), and EHR solutions are all provided as software as a service (SaaS). For more information visit www.axolotl.com and follow us on Twitter.
OptumInsight, headquartered in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, has more than 10,800 professionals in offices across the globe, including 100 in Michigan based in Lansing, Ann Arbor and Kalamazoo.