Interoperable health IT is a major component of an expanded partnership between the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Indian Health Service to improve the health of Native American and Native Alaskan veterans. The two government agencies last week signed a memorandum of understanding that spells out a plan for better coordination of care, resource sharing and collaboration based on the strengths of each entity.

"This memorandum of understanding is a renewal of the important partnership between the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Indian Health Service. It represents VA's commitment to American Indian and Alaska Native veterans through associations with the Indian Health Service and tribal facilities throughout the nation," VA Secretary Eric K. Shinseki said in a prepared statement. "The partnership further expands VA's capability to serve those veterans within their communities and provides increased access for veterans in extremely rural areas."

The memorandum of understanding expands on a VA-IHS partnership first established in 2003.

According to InformationWeek, the new MOU calls for enabling caregiver access to EHRs and telehealth technologies such as telepsychiatry and telepharmacy for Indian or Alaska Native veterans, regardless of whether patient records are stored on VA or IHS servers. Healthcare IT News reports that the VA and IHS will jointly develop new applications and technology, allow each agency to adapt apps developed by the other and create mechanisms for exchanging funding to support this collaboration.

The two agencies will work together on new models of care based on telehealth services, mobile communications and sharing of training programs. They also will establish implementation workgroups to improve joint emergency, disaster and pandemic preparedness and response planning.

For additional details:
- see this Healthcare IT News story
- here's a story that appeared in InformationWeek
- read the memorandum of understanding between the VA and the IHS (.pdf)

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