Is EHR data blocking really as bad as ONC claims?

Consensus that EHR vendors and profit-hungry hospitals are intentionally making it hard for patients and others to access date is based on evidence – much of it put forth by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT – that is largely anecdotal. Center for Medical Interoperability vice president Kerry McDermott says data blocking is a systemic issue because information sharing is a new practice in healthcare.

With $32 billion spent already to achieve the meaningful exchange of healthcare and patient information, the federal government is hard at work trying to find where and how data is being blocked. But whether data blocking is intentional, or not, remains a subjective question based largely on anecdotes that deserve speculation...

Kerry McDermottDeSalvo is not the only to contend that data is being blocked for nefarious reasons. "It is very frustrating not be able to send information electronically to another party, to find out they can't receive it digitally, or that it doesn't make sense when it's received," said David Kibbe, MD, president and CEO of DirectTrust, a nonprofit collaborative to support interoperability. But he doesn't feel it's always just an innocent aspect of misplaced priorities or misaligned technology. "In a fee-for-service health care system, information isn't just power, it's money, too," said Kibbe. "So it is natural that we'll get information hoarding, information blocking, and information channeling as means to an end by some entities."...

Kerry McDermott, vice president of public policy and communications at the Center for Medical Interoperability says all the finger-pointing about data blocking isn't helpful. "It's more of a systemic issue, not limited to a specific party," McDermott explained. "In the grand scheme of things, sharing data is new." In the past, it wasn't beneficial for doctors and vendors to share data and so it follows, she added, that most of the technology in place today was not exactly engineered with interoperability in mind. But now with the changes in value-based care reimbursement models, sharing data is going to be imperative...