Feds ask vendors for help with health IT networks

For several years, the Nationwide Health Information Network has been operating pilot projects with more than a dozen federal and state agencies, but the truth is, it still doesn't seem to be anywhere near production-ready. 

Hoping to speed things along, HHS has put out a request for information asking vendors to share their best ideas on how to "generate an initial national strategic framework for a national health information infrastructure." The vendors' job is--and brace yourself for a lot of agency names--to help out the National Gap Analysis and Readiness Assessment for the Health Information Technology Infrastructure.

Vendors who choose to respond to the RFI will be asked to look at how federal agencies like CMS, the Health Resources and Services Administration, the CDC, state Medicaid agencies and state public health departments can be brought together into a shared information infrastructure. The vendors are being asked to describe what steps HHS can take, breaking them down into levels of effort, deliverables and a timetable.

All that being said, it's hard to tell whether all of this will really bring the NHIN project along further. (It's worth pointing out that the RFI notes specifically that the agency may not end up spending any money with any of these vendors.) Call me a cynic, but I'm not optimistic about any dramatic short-term progress (i.e. within the next two to three years) being made.

To learn more about the RFI:
- read this Federal Computer Week piece

Related Articles:
NHIN going live early next year for SSA
HHS to sponsor open source 'code-a-thon' for NHIN
FCC offers $400 million to connect providers with NHIN

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