Interoperability is Healthcare’s Tower of Babel

2. Convert paper into digital information: No matter which technologies you employ, information stored on paper simply does not connect to anyone or anything. Paper is also bulky and difficult to store. And because paper information is less secure than its digital counterparts, it can be mishandled or lost by clinicians. Use an advanced scan and capture solution to integrate important paper forms directly into your EHR.

3. Enable remote access to information: Health systems today provide care to the same patients across multiple locations. Many employ nurses who work remotely. Wherever your healthcare employees are, they need access to data. A sync-and-share solution puts folders and files at your fingertips regardless of your location, while helping to maintain security and compliance.

4. Regularly cleanse your data: For interoperability success, it’s important to normalize and cleanse data. This enables health systems and IDNs to compare similar data when making care decisions, rather than unstructured data that is dissimilar. Bonus: Clean data also helps protect against potential hacks. Many health information attacks are relatively low-risk from the criminal’s perspective, largely because IT cleanliness is not commonplace in healthcare so old data is not disposed of correctly. Keeping your data clean helps mitigate the potential risk.

Interoperability and collaboration are the keys to better care. Your systems may not always speak the same language, but you still have the opportunity to “translate” by better connecting people with data.