A new set of standards Designed to enable the seamless and secure exchange of social determinants of health, sexual orientation and gender identity data.
The Office of the National Health Information Technology Coordinator issued Friday U.S. Interoperability Core Data The second edition or USCDI v2 includes new health data categories and constituent data elements, including elements related to social factors that affect health, such as access to stable housing, food, and income, as well as gender identity and sexual orientation.
The first version of USCDI was adopted as an interoperability standard ONC’s final rules of the cure bill, Designed to allow patients and their healthcare providers to safely access health information. It includes standardized data categories and elements on allergies, immunizations, patient demographics, and clinical records.
The new version updates this set of standards to ensure that the social determinants of health and the specific healthcare needs of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender patients can be identified and addressed.
“For accurate, compassionate and safe care, it’s important to make the patient’s sexual orientation and gender identity part of their care coordination. This new version helps to prioritize the next steps in the healthcare community and helps identify The specific non-medical needs of patients,” Dr. Rachel Levine, Assistant Secretary for Health Affairs of the Department of Health and Human Services, said at a press conference.
USCDI Version 2 includes three new data categories and a total of 22 new data elements. These are selected from more than 600 data categories and elements, including merged and repeated data elements, which are submitted by the health IT community as part of the update set development cycle.
“USCDI Version 2 is based on the feedback we have received from various stakeholders,” said Dr. Micky Tripathi, National Health Information Technology Coordinator, in a press release. “We heard that this new version of the USCDI should reflect the diversity of the United States, including data elements such as sexual orientation, gender identity, and social determinants of health, while helping to address minority, marginalized, and underrepresented individuals and communities’ The difference in results.”
The new version of USCDI is now available as part of consideration ONC’s standard version promotion process, This will be held in the fall. During this process, health IT developers will be able to update their certified products to support this updated version of USCDI. But currently the second edition is voluntary.
Some developers need to provide their customers with upgraded health IT that supports USCDI version 1 before December 31, 2022. The new version of the standard set can only be enforced through the new final rules.
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