Rhode Island’s Consent Model

With regard to gathering health care data, the law requires that patients and health care providers shall have the choice to participate in currentcare.  In other words, Rhode Island requires opt-in before a patient and a health care provider participates.  The opt-in by both the provider and the patient is required before the patient’s confidential health data can flow into currentcare.

Encore Career

I retired in January, this year, as the Chief Information Officer of the City of Providence, capping a career of over 40 years in various IT-related roles.  In the course of these years, I coded application software for IBM, taught computer programming and systems analysis in the Navy, and led IT projects in aerospace engineering, discrete manufacturing, municipal government, public safety, financial services, and computer services.  I was deeply involved in the major transitions in IT service delivery - from batch processing to SaaS - and in using IT innovations to transform the way organizations deliver results.

Upon retiring, I wondered what to do next.  Having good health, a daughter in middle school, and a desire to do something worthwhile motivated me to search for something new, an encore career if you will.

In the midst of the search, a friend thrust T. R. Reid’s The Healing of America: A Global Quest for Better, Cheaper, and Fairer Health Care into my hands, hoping it might inspire me to get involved in reforming health care.  It did.  While I was aware of the need for reform, Reid raised the issue to the level of a moral imperative.  I was infuriated to learn that our health care system is, by far, the most expensive in the world and yet delivers health care which, compared to other industrialized countries, ranks last.  Moreover, he made it clear that IT can have a lot to do with correcting this sorry state of affairs.  Surely, I thought, with so much experience in IT-driven organizational change, there must be something I can do to help advance health care delivery in America.

Thus began an eight month odyssey.  The journey led me to more than forty people, most of them here in Rhode Island, who are leading the transformation of the American health care system.  Together, they represented the many stakeholders affected by the changes.  To them I owe tremendous thanks for their patience and willingness to share their observations and insights.  Along the way, I read several books which deepened my personal understanding of the issues, challenges and proposed solutions.  Chief among these were Clayton Chistensen’s The Innovator’s Prescription: A Disruptive Solution for Health Care and Michael Porter and Elizabeth Teisberg’s Redefining Health Care: Creating Value-Based Competition on Results.

In Rhode Island, the Rhode Island Quality Institute (RIQI) has a pivotal role in advancing health care.  Its board members represent a broad cross-section of the local stakeholders, and they have created an institution capable of constructively addressing the multitude of issues and developing workable solutions.  Shortly after beginning my search, I met RIQI’s visionary and passionately commtted leader, Laura Adams, who encouraged me to get involved.  I began attending RIQI’s Board Meetings, the public reviews of the “HIE Strategic and Operational Plan”, and the rollout of the Regional Extension Center. 

My search for something new to do entered a new phase in mid-October.  Through a friend, I learned that RIQI was seeking to hire a director for its Health Information Exchange program.  For me, the timing was ideal.  Already familiar with the program and acquainted with many of the players, I knew this would be a great opportunity.  Laura and her team agreed, and at the beginning of November I joined RIQI as the Director, HIE Program Management.

In future posts I will tell of my experiences with the HIE Program, with particular emphasis on the issues that challenge us and the approaches we are taking.