NC HIEA March 2021 Update

 

The NC HIEA applauds the work and resilience of the health care community this year and is a proud partner with you!

NC*Notify: Version 4 Features and Capabilities

NC HealthConnex is pleased to offer new notification features and updates in the latest version of NC*Notify. Current subscribers will now have access to COVID-19 lab result alerts, allowing them to react to positive cases in a more timely manner. 

NC*Notify is a subscription-based service that notifies providers as their patients receive services across the care continuum. Based on admission, discharge, and transfer data received from more than 100 participating hospitals, plus encounter data from more than 6,000 ambulatory care settings, the NC*Notify real-time event notifications provide care teams with valuable information that spans geographic and care settings, and supports state and federal efforts to focus on patient-centered care. 

“Having access to timely information about when our patients are seen at the hospital is always important to deliver better care. But especially during a public health crisis such as COVID-19, having access to timely notifications when my patients have been admitted or released from the hospital helps our staff schedule important follow up care,” said Dr. Harriett Burns, associate medical director and primary care provider at Piedmont Health Services Inc., an NC*Notify subscriber, and member of the N.C. Health Information Exchange Authority Advisory Board. 

In addition to the COVID-19 notifications, new alerts that are now available include:

  • High Utilizer Alert
    This notification will help providers identify frequent visitors to the Emergency Department (two or more visits in 90 days or less) or patients that are at high risk for readmission (four or more admissions in 12 months). 
  • Dental Alerts
    Providers will be alerted when patients visit the Emergency Department for dental care.
  • Care Team Change Alert
    Providers will be informed when a new organization has subscribed to their patient.
  • Diabetes Diagnosis Alert
    Providers will be alerted upon a new diabetes and/or pre-diabetes diagnosis for patients they are monitoring. 
  • Chronic Care Management Alert 
    Providers will receive an alert when a patient meets the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Chronic Care Management (CCM) services criteria. 

The COVID-19 alert feature will be made available automatically to our NC*Notify dashboard subscribers. To prepare for the other upcoming upgrades, each existing subscriber will need to review and make necessary changes to ingest the new notification result files adhering to the NC*Notify V4 Technical Specifications and NC*Notify V4+ Technical Specifications before April 13, 2021. 

Have questions? Find Version 4 FAQs here. For more information or questions about NC*Notify, contact the NC HealthConnex Team at hiea@nc.gov. To learn how to enroll in NC*Notify, click here. 

NC HIEA and DHHS Continue CVMS Efforts

The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (NC DHHS) and the North Carolina Health Information Exchange Authority (NC HIEA), continue to work together to automate COVID-19 vaccine administration reporting.

NC DHHS manages the COVID-19 Vaccine Management System (CVMS), a cloud-based vaccine management solution for COVID-19 that enables vaccine management and data sharing across the care continuum. This system allows for vaccine providers in North Carolina to submit cases or inquiries regarding COVID-19 vaccines. 

NC HealthConnex offers connectivity to CVMS and patient matching across sources to enhance vaccine data by utilizing the NC HealthConnex master patient index.  NC HealthConnex receives COVID-19 vaccine administration data from points of care such as hospitals and health systems, retail and community pharmacies, county health departments and other entities that are administering the COVID vaccine. To reduce double data entry, NC HealthConnex has continued to help with integrating health care providers’ EHRs and pharmacy management systems with the CVMS database. This data exchange reduces the need for manual entry of vaccine administration data directly into CVMS. 

For more information, contact the NC HealthConnex Team at hiea@nc.gov.

NC HIEA and AHEC Virtual Training Opportunities

The NC HIEA and North Carolina Area Health Education Centers (NC AHEC) are offering a library of virtual training modules for health care providers on various NC HealthConnex services.

To get started, providers can register for a series of seven video trainings, each providing an orientation to the features and services available. The newest module, Module 7: NC*Notify, offers an overview of how NC*Notify works, how the practice will learn what is required to enroll and receive alerts, and hear use cases of how other practices are implementing NC*Notify into their daily workflow.

After attending a training module, a participant reported that their practice could “successfully incorporate NC HealthConnex into practice workflow easily.” They included that “the interface is very user friendly, and we anticipate utilizing NC HealthConnex as a part of the daily workflow, including NC*Notify.”

Registration for the following modules is required to receive a link to the training.

These virtual offerings provide health care professionals with an introduction to NC HealthConnex or help brush up on NC HealthConnex knowledge. In the midst of a pandemic, these modules offer a stress-free method of receiving training and staying up-to-date on all applications within NC HealthConnex.

For more detailed instructions on how to use the training software, visit our Training and Resources webpage.

Security and Risk Awareness

The N.C. Department of Information Technology’s Enterprise Security and Risk Management Office (ESRMO) provides leadership in the development, delivery and maintenance of a cybersecurity program that safeguards North Carolina’s information and supports infrastructure against unauthorized use, disclosure, modification, damage or loss.

The ESRMO also works with state agencies, federal and local governments, citizens and private-sector businesses to help manage risk to support secure and sustainable information technology services to meet the needs of North Carolina’s citizens.

In an effort to ensure greater security awareness and practices, the NC HIEA is pleased to share the ESRMO monthly newsletter. In addition to articles on the rise in work-from-home email phishing schemes, check out the six tips to improve your organization’s cybersecurity posture. The following six tips can help protect yourself and others: 

  1. Avoid being social engineered.
  2. Keep software up to date.
  3. Practice good password management.
  4. Physically secure your computing devices.
  5. Install and maintain antivirus protections.
  6. Safeguard sensitive data. 

Check out the rest of the newsletter!  
 

Upcoming Events

  • March How to Connect Call
    Monday, March 29, 2021, at 12 p.m. To register for this meeting, click here. 
  • NC HIEA Advisory Board Meeting
    Wednesday, June 9, 2021, at 2:30 p.m. To attend this meeting, email trista.nance@nc.gov.

Partner News & Events

NCDHHS Expands Data on Federal Programs on Vaccine Dashboard – NC DHHS has expanded its vaccine data dashboard to provide information on people who have been partially or fully vaccinated through the federal long-term care and retail pharmacy programs. Users will be able to view information about who has been vaccinated through these programs by county, race, ethnicity, gender and age group and by week. www.ncdhhs.gov 

In the News

Community Health Centers, FQHCs Step Up in Vaccine Health Equity – About half of first COVID-19 vaccine doses given at community health centers and FQHCs have gone to people of color, a key step forward for health equity.

One U.S. State's Laser Focus on Data Helps Shrink Racial Vaccine Gap – North Carolina is among the best-performing U.S. states when it comes to distributing vaccines evenly among Black and White residents. That’s partly because the state is by far the best at collecting demographic data.

3 Measures to Prepare Your Healthcare Center for a Cyberattack – Small and medium healthcare organizations rushed to build their digital infrastructure during the pandemic, but doing so has introduced new cybersecurity threats that small businesses cannot afford, according to a March 22 article published in Forbes.

Are You Up to Speed?

The North Carolina Broadband Survey is designed to gather information on locations in the state without adequate internet access and speeds.

The information gathered from the survey will:

  • Provide clear data to guide investment of funds through the state’s Growing Rural Economies with Access to Technology grant program
  • Inform research and policy recommendations
  • Support strategic targeting of additional funding streams

The survey is a collaboration between the N.C. Department of Information Technology’s Broadband Infrastructure Office and the Friday Institute for Education Innovation at NC State University.

The survey takes about 5 minutes to complete and is available in both English and Spanish. Participants are encouraged to also take the optional internet speed test to connect survey data with broadband speed information.

Take the survey.