HL7 Mobile Health Workgroup

HL7 Mobile Health Workgroup

http://www.hl7.org/Special/committees/mobile/index.cfm

HL7 Workgroup for mHealth

Mobile Health Workgroup Mission

The Mobile Health workgroup supports the HL7 mission by creating and promoting health (information technology) standards for mobile health device communications used in the practice of medicine, wellness, and public health.

The goal of the Mobile Health (mHealth) Work Group is to support the HL7 mission of developing standards for mobile health services, data and information interoperability, security and integration in mobile and wireless healthcare and public health systems to reduce costs, improve quality and delivery, guide informed-decisions and promote individual and population health.

More specifically the mHealth WG will create and maintain:

○  Standards for Best Practices for data handling

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Charter

●  Identify data standards and functional requirements

●  Identify and promote terminology for interoperability

●  Coordinate and cooperate with other groups interested in using data from mobile communication devices to promote health, wellness, and for public health purposes

The mobile Health Work Group will:

○  Provide a joint forum for HL7 members who are interested in, planning to create, mobile applications and/or mobile devices that exchange, store, secure, analyze and transmit data and information including PHI (Protected Health Information)

○  This forum will consider and recommend various approaches that have already been specified in the HL7 organization when appropriate. e.g., CDA

○  Consider approaches(clarify?) outside the HL7 community, which have been proven and or are currently in use e.g., Direct Project for secure messaging.

○  Provide feedback from the implementation community into the data standards development process, especially in areas where the standard lacks functionality or clarity of documentation.

○ 

We need to be more specific and it may help to have a scope:

○  Types of mobile devices: eg smartphones, laptops

○  Types of mobile technologies: eg telemedicine, surveillance, cloud

○  Regulatory classes: eg FDA

○  Solutions: eg chronic diseases, emergencies, clinical decision, EHR integration

○  Issues: eg security and privacy

○  Global mHealth (representatives, developing countries, EU etc)

○ 

●  Work Products and Contributions to HL7 Processes

○  International data standards(requirements, information models, terminology)

○  Documentation-KnowledgeBase (maintain, update, disseminate)

○  Presentations, Communication (wiki, socialmedia, conferences)

○  Provide a forum for discussion about standards and definitions to promote interoperability

○  functional model and profile ( in collaboration with EHR HL7 EG)

●  Proposed (Formal or Informal) Relationships with Other HL7 Groups

○  Health Care Devices

○  Electronic Health Records

○  Patient Safety

○  Regulated Clinical Research Information Management

○  CIC

○  Architectural Review Board

●  Proposed (Formal or Informal) Relationships with Groups Outside of HL7

○  International Organization for Standardization (ISO) – ISO TC 215 Health Informatics

○  Health and Human Services (HHS), Assistant Secretary for Planning

○  Office of National Coordinator (ONC)

○  Certification Commission for Health Information Technology (CCHIT)

○  Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS)

○  American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA)

○  eHealth Initiative (eHI)

○  Mobile industry(Apple, Verizon, Google, AT&T, Microsoft, Intel etc)

○  Government(FDA, FTC, ONC, FCC, GAO, AHRQ), EU, AU, Asia, Africa, WHO

○  Continua Health Alliance, ASTM, mHealth Initiative

○  Industries(Verizon, AT&T, Google, Apple...)

Resources

●  http://www.fda.gov/medicaldevices/productsandmedicalprocedures/ucm255978.htm

●  http://healthit.hhs.gov/portal/server.pt/community/healthit_hhs_gov__mobile_devices_roundtable/3815

●  http://www.fic.nih.gov/ResearchTopics/Pages/MobileHealth.aspx

●  http://www.hhs.gov/open/initiatives/mhealth/index.html

●  http://www.who.int/goe/mobile_health/en/index.html