Ask the Expert: How do you integrate with my EHR?
Chris Anderson, Senior Integration Developer
Christina Hearn, Integration Analyst
Vyne Medical’s vision is to advance healthcare delivery by improving the coordination of patient information and closing gaps in communication processes across the continuum of care. Our integration services play an important role in connecting disconnected data for our healthcare clients.
What is an integration?
Simply put, an integration is a communication between two or more diverse software systems. An integration can be either mono-directional (one-way) or bi-directional (two-way) so that data/functionality flows smoothly between those systems.
What is the value of an integration?
Our Trace® platform is a digital repository that houses communication events in the form of faxes, voice recordings and document images. The system works as a standalone as interactions are assigned to the individual patient record thereby enabling coordinated care and documentation to help ensure proper reimbursement. The real value of Trace, however, comes from its ability to integrate this information with other systems thereby helping to ensure that right information is available to the right resources at the right time.
Who does Vyne Medical integrate with?
We integrate with more than ten software systems, a list that continues to grow. Systems we currently integrate with include: Allscripts, athenahealth, Cerner, CGI Sovera, ChartMaxx, Epic Systems, Hyland OnBase, McKesson, MEDITECH, and NextGen Healthcare.
What integration types does Vyne Medical offer?
HL7 Integrations. Our most common form of integration, HL7, is the method Trace uses to retrieve patient data for indexing, as well as build custom automation and workflow improvements. The HL7 interface helps to ensure that records are indexed accurately and consistently and facilitates auto-population of data fields within Trace. Additionally, records indexed to HL7 patient data and document type can be exported automatically from Trace to a designated document imaging system.
Export Integrations. Our export integrations facilitate the transfer of information from Trace to external information systems such as the hospital’s EHR or document management system. Export functionality can transfer both Trace transactions as well as the indexed information around these records to the receiving application. This makes it possible to include Trace files in the patient’s medical record, while also eliminating the manual process of entering data from Trace into another system.
To facilitate an export, we transform the Trace file or image and its associated patient data into a format that the client’s system is configured to accept. Using one of our available integration methods, Trace sends associated files and images to the patient’s chart. When these records are selected from the patient’s chart, the EHR matches the patient data and displays the image. We are constantly adding to our list of available integration methods which currently includes: File System, FTP, HTTP(S), LLP, RESTful, SFTP, SOAP, and TCP/IP.
For integrations involving voice, Vyne Medical typically uses hyperlink functionality to deliver a link of an audio file to the patient record. This method is most effective for audio exports since EHRs are not typically capable of audio playback and therefore require a link to play the audio through Trace.
Import Integrations. Through our import integrations, files from other systems can be imported into Trace and subsequently made available to all Trace features. Import is a valuable tool for automating common manual tasks such as recording and downloading phone calls, faxing results to referring physicians and creating work queues for hospital staff. Trace import works by importing files via a “cold feed” from a single shared folder that is periodically polled for new files. For each import, Trace requires an image or audio file along with a corresponding metadata file. Once imported into Trace, images and recording are immediately accessible for retrieval and routing to third parties.
Custom Integrations. At Vyne Medical, we are always open to new ideas and designing innovations to help clients automate specific processes and workflows. Examples of recent custom integrations include creating orders within the EHR and auto-reconciling documents to a scheduled patient account.
View and download our infographic to learn more about the “4 Types of Integrations for the Trace Platform.”
What data integration formats are available?
The Trace interface engine is extremely flexible and supports a variety of integrated data formats. Many of our integrations are conducted via HL7 and are supported with the newest HL7 standard Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR). We can also support cold-feed, web services and API integrations. The following shows our growing list of supported integrated data formats: CDA, CCD, CSV, EDI, FHIR, HL7, JSON, TEXT, X12, XML.
What integration opportunities are on the horizon?
Vyne Medical’s integration team continually evaluates new opportunities to connect disconnected data by bridging gaps between systems. Potential areas of expansion include CDA/C-CDA (Clinical Document Architecture) for clinical document exchange and DICOM® (Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine) for transmission, storage and retrieval of medical imaging information.
To learn more about Vyne Medical integration services and capabilities, please contact us to schedule a call with one of our healthcare solution experts today.