The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE); the state designee for health information technology, is facilitating the creation of strategic and operational plans for a statewide infrastructure for health information exchange (HIE). These plans will act as a blue print to a contemplated not-for-profit organization responsible for the deployment and operation of the Kansas HIE.  To guide the planning and implementation process, KDHE has convened the e-Health Advisory Council to provide broad based stakeholders representation from thirty-three plus health care organizations.

The primary goal of this health information exchange is to enable healthcare stakeholders to share data for coordinating patient care and to support public entities in achieving their population health goals. More specifically, this process will enable stakeholders to focus on developing medical homes for Kansans and on utilizing the chronic care model to address identified disease conditions.

To enable this statewide interoperability of healthcare data, it is necessary to align a number of concurrent projects through a coordinated approach. This coordinated approach requires the participation of key state health information technology project leaders in an e-Health Advisory Steering Committee. This steering committee includes the domain chairs from each of the e-Health Advisory Council workgroups, as well as representatives from Kansas Medicaid, the Regional Extension Center, and a Quality Improvement Consortium.

The measurement of project outcomes is critical to the success of this highly visible public and private partnership.  Over the course of this four-year project, KDHE will measure and publicly report quarterly on a number of key measures including: 1) The increase in the number of stakeholders accessing the exchange for the purpose of coordinating patient care; 2) The increase in the number of Kansans with their care coordinated through a medical home; and 3) The increase in the number of Kansans participating in chronic disease management programs.

Identified products of this project include a state strategic health information technology plan, a statewide operation plan for health information exchange, and the public reporting of key measures identifying the benefits of this project to Kansas stakeholders.