Arizona`s Regional Behavioral Health Authorities Support Statewide HIE Integration Plan

 Arizona’s three regional behavioral health authorities (RBHAs) have joined in a statewide plan to integrate physical and behavioral health in the statewide health information exchange (HIE), The Network, operated by the non-profit Arizona Health-e Connection (AzHeC). 

Mercy Maricopa Integrated Care (Mercy Maricopa); Health Choice Integrated Care; and Cenpatico Integrated Care have made a significant investment in the plan that will connect behavioral health providers to the statewide network and integrate access to physical and behavioral health information into workflows and clinical decision making. The leaders of the three RBHAs support the plan because of the significant potential to improve health care and outcomes statewide. 

“We know that providing more complete information for clinical decision making will improve care coordination and patient outcomes, especially for our members with comorbid physical and behavioral health conditions,” said Eddy Broadway, CEO of Mercy Maricopa. Tom Betlach, director of the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS), Arizona’s Medicaid Agency that manages the three RBHAs, is very supportive of the statewide plan.

“We need to improve the value of the care delivered to all AHCCCS members, and one clear way to do that is for all of a member’s providers to share information and better coordinate care,” Betlach said.

The plan aims to make participation simple and easy for all community providers, with one single connection and one fee structure for all community providers. The hospital and health plan participants in the statewide HIE, along with several grants and contracts, cover 100 percent of the HIE’s operating costs so that community providers, including community behavioral health providers, do not pay fees for participating, according to Melissa Kotrys, CEO of Arizona Health-e Connection.

“The more that we can encourage participation in and connectivity to The Network, the more patient information that will be available for all providers,” Kotrys said.“It sounds simple and is simple, but this is ultimately how we will enable better care coordination and clinical decision making.”

A key challenge in integrating physical and behavioral health data is the complex statutory framework that governs these two types of data. There are three basic sets of laws that apply: the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), the federal substance abuse treatment privacy laws (42 CFR Part 2 in the Code of Federal Regulations), and Arizona’s health information organization (HIO) law. 

AzHeC’s integrated HIE will employ a layered, scalable process that meets all state and federal legal requirements for patient notification and consent while affording all patient rights under the laws.   

This plan also includes deploying a statewide crisis portal that can provide access to critical patient information in an emergency. AzHeC has developed the crisis portal and has provided training for behavioral health providers in central Arizona.

Training for behavioral health providers in southern and northern Arizona will be completed in the coming months, with a phased roll-out of the crisis portal planned by region.

Arizona Health-e Connection is a non-profit, public-private partnership that drives the adoption of health information technology (HIT) and advances the secure and private sharing of electronic health information exchange (HIE).

Services offered by the statewide HIE include:  

• Bidirectional Exchange – A bidirectional connection between The Network and a Network participant’s certified electronic health record (EHR) 

• Provider and Payer Portals – web-based portals that provide access to clinical information and beneficiary clinical information one record at a time

• Direct Secure Email – HIPAA compliant, encrypted, standards-based Direct Secure Messaging between Network participants, typically used to receive alerts and notifications

• Alerts and Notifications – Real-time alerts and notifications on events such as a hospital admission-discharge-transfer or the receipt of a specific lab or test result

• Public Health Reporting – A single connection or gateway expected to go-live in late 2016 that will allow Network participants to submit state and federally required public health information from their certified EHR

• eHealth Exchange – The secure electronic exchange of patient information via the national eHealth Exchange network