Re: Information Blocking by Electronic Health Record Vendors
Dear Mr. Cannatti and Ms. Marchesini:
The undersigned members of the Physician Clinical Registry Coalition (the “Coalition”) are
writing to express our ongoing concerns about information blocking by electronic health record
(“EHR”) vendors. The Coalition is a group of 25 medical societies and other physician-led
organizations that sponsor clinical data registries that collect identifiable patient information for
quality improvement and patient safety purposes to help participating providers monitor clinical
outcomes among their patients. We are committed to advocating for policies that enable the
development of clinical data registries and enhance their ability to improve quality of care
through the analysis and reporting of these outcomes.
The Coalition strongly advocated for the information blocking language included within the 21st
Century Cures Act (Pub. L. 114-146) (the “Cures Act”) to prevent EHR vendors from blocking
the transmission of clinical outcomes data to third parties, such as clinical data registries. The
Cures Act prohibits EHR vendors from interfering with, preventing, or materially discouraging the access, exchange, or use of electronic health information, and grants the Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) Office of the Inspector General (“OIG”) the authority to
investigate and impose penalties upon an EHR vendor that engages in such information
blocking. The ability of clinical data registries to access patient information from EHR vendors
is crucial for such registries to achieve their missions of improving quality of care.
…
Read full letter here
