Managing Technology and Standards

Introduction

Although actual technical implementation of health information technology is one of the last stages to be undertaken - the one where the 'rubber meets the road' - the decisions about which standards to use and which technologies to implement should be made early, as there are significant interactions between policy decisions (about privacy protection, for example) and the technical decisions (use of a record locator service to index distributed databases, for example). There are sufficiently robust standards currently available today to support the migration to an interoperable healthcare information network. However, successful implementation requires that all parties must agree to adhere to those standards.

The Technology and Standards section provides background on standards development and describes the technical challenges involved in health information technology. The Technology and Standards module of the Toolkit provides:

• A shared vision for health information technology standards
• Guiding principles for using technology and applying standards;
• Broad strategies and actions to use technology and standards to improve the quality, safety and efficiency of healthcare through health IT and health information exchange
• Best practices and community experiences in health information technology (HIT)
• Comprehensive resources and tools to help organizations trying to understand these issues