What is the difference between a regional health information organization, and a health information exchange?
To get information from different points of care into a patient’s record, competitors are being brought together to find ways to collaborate around HIT in experiments across the country. Health information exchange (HIE) is the electronic movement of health-care information among organizations in a system that assures that the information is understood in the same way wherever it goes. A regional health information exchange (RHIO) provides the rules, governance structure and technology to allow health information exchange at a defined local level. The term may be applied to full-fledged, free-standing organizations that enable health information exchange. Other activities and entities—such as exchanges among a limited number of entities or for narrow purposes—may simply be called health information exchanges, a term that is beginning to be used interchangeably with “RHIO.” Patients generally visit providers that are within a reasonable driving distance from their residence. Because pro
