Why closed systems are killing progress in healthcare | Viewpoint

More than a decade has passed since national initiatives first ignited widespread demand for digital adoption in healthcare.

During this time, the industry has seen a flood of technology solutions enter the market with arguably mixed results.

Healthcare leaders fundamentally understand that innovations such as AI, automation, telehealth, electronic health records (EHRs), robotics and predictive analytics all hold tremendous capacity for driving transformative change. Yet much of this potential remains unfulfilled. The underlying material barrier? Siloed systems that struggle to share data effectively.

Software companies are most burdened by this issue. Innovation in healthcare is intrinsically linked to interoperability, but the industry is plagued with seemingly insurmountable obstacles, especially for emerging vendors trying to bring best-in-class products to the market.

Technology continues to advance at a pace well beyond the historical appetite of adoption in healthcare, but at this moment in time, the industry must decide to embrace this new wave of innovation.

Overcoming current barriers requires a collective adoption of open standards to support seamless interoperability and unrestricted integration between discrete systems. An open and connected ecosystem democratizes access, driving more innovation, increased competition and higher-quality solutions.

Disrupting the status quo

Today, software companies bringing new technology to market face an uphill battle navigating regulatory requirements while attempting to integrate across overly complex, fragmented networks. These perennial barriers effectively stifle innovation, yet the need to disrupt the status quo is gaining recognition at the national level.

The federal government in a recent announcement underscored national support for a new CMS Interoperability Framework, emphasizing the importance of “tearing down digital walls” and “returning power to the patients.” This voluntary framework serves as a call to action for health data networks to embrace a modern exchange model based on open standards and market-friendliness.

This shift is critical in an industry long dominated by a handful of incumbents whose solutions often restrict connectivity and, by extension, progress towards transformative innovation. As a result, providers have made enormous investments in EHR infrastructure and practice management (PM) systems that may indeed deliver a broad range of features, but often at the expense of mediocrity.

When the ecosystem supports open integration of best-in-class solutions with existing EHR and PM systems, the results are tangible.

Consider scheduling as a prime example, an area ripe for improvement across patient access, patient experience and operational efficiency. Most EHRs and PMs provide only basic scheduling functionality with limited support for self-scheduling despite overwhelming patient demand.

When self-scheduling is integrated into existing infrastructure, a nationwide analysis shows a 50% decrease in no-show rates and a 21% reduction in cancellations of self-scheduled appointments.

A better path forward – AI and APIs

A renaissance of innovation in healthcare requires a shift toward open and interoperable standards like HL7 Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR). Cloud-native platforms that support robust application programming interfaces (APIs) are key to enabling scalable, system-wide integration across healthcare stakeholders.

APIs are essential building blocks for enabling innovation around the edges of EHR and practice management systems. The speed and scale of innovation should not be fundamentally constrained by a single vendor. Instead, software companies are increasingly providing APIs to enable partners and clients to develop new solutions on top of existing platforms, accelerating collective progress.

Likewise, recent advancements in AI technology are beginning to unlock and democratize access to new channels of innovation in healthcare. In this emerging environment, strong partnerships will create greater speed and leverage, whereas organizations that continue to operate in silos will face a growing risk of obsolescence.

The confluence of AI and interoperability has the potential to radically shift the competitive landscape of the healthcare technology sector. Only then can the industry begin to fully realize the long-promised benefits of digital health and meaningful data exchange.

Consider the opportunities for improvement based on these findings alone: An analysis of 23,000 medical malpractice lawsuits revealed that more than 7,000 were linked to communication failures, some of which were likely attributed to the lack of shared and timely information between providers.

Breakdowns of this nature, often driven by interoperability gaps, such as missed handoffs, inaccessible records or incompatible systems, resulted in $1.7 billion in malpractice costs and almost 2,000 preventable deaths.

This is a watershed moment in healthcare. The time to unlock and embrace true innovation is now.

David Edwards is chief technology officer at Relatient.