Florida Health Information Exchange (HIE) Cooperative Agreement Program

The Florida HIE Cooperative Agreement Program application was submitted on October 15, 2009 to the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology.   On March 15, 2010, the Agency was notified that it was awarded $20.7 million in federal funding to be used over a four-year period for the purpose of supporting statewide health information exchange. 

The 2010 Florida Legislature directed the Agency to issue an Invitation to Negotiate (ITN) for the selection of a technology organization to implement the statewide HIE infrastructure under the HIE Cooperative Agreement by July 15, 2010. The Agency was also directed to submit a report to the President of the Senate and Speaker of the House regarding the Agency's plan for the use of program funds by August 1, 2010. The attached Florida Health Information Exchange Report (.pdf 1.14 MB) describes program background, project objectives and specific services proposed for the state health information exchange infrastructure.

Florida Health Information Exchange Report (.pdf 1.14 MB)

The Strategic and Operational Plan (SOP) will be revised to reflect the outcomes of the legislative session and provided to the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology for review and approval.  In addition, comments received from stakeholders since the application was submitted in October 2009 will be incorporated.  The revised SOP will form the foundation for the ITN scope of work.

On April 8, 2010, the Agency issued the attached Request for Information (RFI) on Health Information Exchange for public response. The deadline for submitting responses to the RFI was May 3, 2010.  The Agency completed reviews of RFI responses in May, 2010 and the attached respondant contact information was published as a result.  The information provided in RFI responses will serve as an aid to the Agency during the development of the ITN. 

Planning and Stakeholder Outreach

Significant planning work remains which will occur prior to and after the cooperative agreement program is initiated.  This includes determining:
(1) initial HIE services to be offered (e.g., clinical messaging, patient look-up and quality metric services) to be offered by the state HIO and implementation stages;
(2) the specifics of the technical architecture to support the HIE services and federal meaningful use requirements;
(3) the legal policy and approach to ensure appropriate levels of privacy, achieve maximum participation, and keep administrative burden to a minimum; and
(4) long-term financial sustainability approaches for maintaining the HIE services.

The Agency is committed to engaging stakeholders in the planning and implementation of statewide HIE.  Below are Proposed HIE Services, dated 12/1/09, posted for comment through December 31, 2009.  Please send your comments to:  FLHII@ahca.myflorida.com.  All comments received are public records and will be posted as submitted below. 

Florida Health Information Exchange Cooperative Agreement Application 

Florida's application for the State Health Information Exchange Cooperative Agreement Program was submitted to the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology on October 15, 2009. The application includes a Strategic and Operational Plan (below). The application and plan address five required domains including coordination activities with Medicaid, other ARRA programs and other States. The domains are:
Governance
Finance
Technical Infrastructure
Business and Technical Operations
Legal Policy

The State will finalize and implement the Strategic and Operational Plan with the participation of the Health Information Exchange Coordinating Council, key stakeholders, and other interested parties.

Florida Health Information Exchange Cooperative Agreement Application (.pdf 300 kb)
Strategic and Operational Plans (.pdf 901 kb)
HIE Letters of Support (.pdf 2.50 MB)


State Health Information Exchange Cooperative Agreement Program 

On August 20, 2009, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology announced the State Health Information Exchange Cooperative Agreement Program through a Funding Opportunity Announcement. 

Cooperative agreements will be awarded through the State Health Information Exchange Cooperative Agreement Program to states and qualified State Designated Entities (SDEs) to develop and advance mechanisms for information sharing across the health care system. Under these State cooperative agreements $564 million will be awarded to support efforts to achieve widespread and sustainable health information exchange (HIE) within and among states through the meaningful use of certified Electronic Health Records (EHRs).

See:   FOA State Health Information Exchange Cooperative Agreement Program
            State Health Information Exchange Facts at a Glance
          

September 24 – 25, 2009 a team of stakeholders from Florida attended the National Governance Association Alliance for E-Health meeting in Washington, D. C.  At this meeting, the Florida team agreed at the beginning that they faced three big questions.

• What are we building?
• Who will run it?
• How will we pay for it?

The preliminary report below is a compilation of notes which are a composite of the conversations with the Florida team and the NGA facilitator over the two day conference.  The report includes suggestions, but the decisions have yet to be made.

See:     National Governance Association 2nd Alliance for E-Health: Preliminary Report

Designation of Agency for Health Care Administration as lead agency to Administer Section 3013 ARRA Funding
Florida's Health Information Exchange Plan