Evaluation of Electronic Health Record (EHR) Interoperability and Analytic Support for the Michigan Care Improvement Registry (MCIR)

Project start date and end date: September 1, 2010 - Present

Background:
Immunization providers have long had the capability to send information electronically regarding vaccination doses administered by their practices to the Michigan Care Improvement Registry (MCIR).  Over the past decade, initiatives by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) have focused on enabling such transfers to take place in real-time through automated connections between practices' electronic health record (EHR) systems and the MCIR using transactions conforming to industry standard HL7 messages. The same standards-based messaging approach can be used to send a patient's complete vaccine history from MCIR to practices' EHRs to achieve bidirectional interoperability. Enabling such standards-based exchanges between EHRs and MCIR will enable wide participation by practices, permitting information for all vaccine doses to be available for immediate use in both systems in real time.

Objectives:
This project aims to 1) evaluate the timeliness, completeness, and accuracy of data transfers to and from MCIR and 2) provide analytic support for MCIR surveillance activities and ad hoc MCIR data requests.   

Research Topics & Methods:
This project will develop and implement data acquisition queries and summary reports to evaluate MCIR data timeliness, completeness, and accuracy.  We will collaborate with local health departments, primary care practices, health systems, retail pharmacies, health information exchange organizations, and MCIR technical staff as needed to identify data quality issues and potential remediation strategies.  In addition, the project provides analytic support for MCIR surveillance activities, periodic data summaries and reports, and ad hoc MCIR data requests as required.

Implications:
This project will foster the identification of opportunities for improvement in electronic reporting to MCIR to facilitate the statewide implementation of real-time, bi-directional interoperability between EHRs and MCIR.  In addition, this activity will develop MCIR data extracts and reports for dissemination by MDHHS.

Funder:
The project is funded by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS).