Published: 1/29/2021 –
MiHIN is happy to announce a new service to help make electronic health information solutions more accessible to care coordinators in Michigan.
Care coordinators are an essential part of the health care team. Most often RNs, care coordinators work across the care continuum—including hospitals, primary care, specialties, and post-acute —to provide help and continuity to patients who are high-risk or have complex needs beyond a single episode of care. Despite their critical importance, care coordinators have not historically been able to leverage Health Information Technology (HIT) solutions because many HIT solutions are designed with clinical providers in mind and either don’t fit the needs of care coordinators or aren’t accessible to them.
Care coordinators whose organizations participate with MiHIN are now able to request a Care Coordinator ID which, within the MiHIN ecosystem, will function in a similar way to a National Provider Identifier (NPI). This means that care coordinators will be listed in the Michigan Health Directory (HD) and able to declare active care relationships via the Active Care Relationship Service (ACRS) with the patients they serve; providing access to timely and actionable information on those patients.
A person should be classified as a “Care Coordinator” in MiHIN’s Health Directory if they meet any of the below criteria (even if they have an NPI):
- They identify their “role” on a patient’s care team as any of the below:
- Care/Case Manager
- Patient Navigator
- Health Coach
- Community Health Worker
- Peer Support Specialist
- They identify their “Function” on a patient’s care team as any of the below:
- Complete Needs Assessment
- Address Long Term Needs
- Address Immediate Needs
- Manage Care Transitions
- Public Health Emergency Coordination
- If they do not identify with the criteria above , but still provide some element of care coordination to their patients as defined by the Michigan multi-stakeholder group definition:
- Monitoring a person’s goals, needs, and preferences;
- Acting as the communication link between two or more participants concerned with a person’s health and wellness;
- Organizing and facilitating care activities and promoting self-management by advocating for, empowering, and educating a person;
- Ensuring safe, appropriate, non-duplicative, and effective integrated care.
Obtaining Care Coordinator IDs for your organization is quick and easy. Most organizations will only need to fill out a batch enrollment form and add their Care Coordinators to their ACRS file. Contact [email protected] or your account executive for more information about how your organization can support Care Coordinators through our services.