STANDARDS AND POLICIES

Device interoperability standards allow independently manufactured products to work together so their individual innovations can interact to advance the entire healthcare system. Device standards improve information sharing at home and in institutional settings.

• Continual Health Alliance has established guidelines for a new world of highly connected personal telehealth products such as fitness, disease management, and elderly care systems. Continua released the Continua Design Guidelines v 1.0 in 2008 and is working on the next generation of use cases, which include full end-to-end interoperability from personal health device to consumer electronic device to backend server to personal health record. Intel helped found and leads Continua.
• The Bluetooth* SIG Medical Devices Working Group defined a base specification to ensure optimized interoperability between health-related devices enabled with Bluetooth wireless technology and collector devices such as PCs, telehealth stations, or mobile phones. Intel chaired this working group through the creation of the Bluetooth Health Device Profile and Multi-Channel Adaptation Protocol v1.0 release and is still active in the group. This group is working on next generation health standards based on ultra low power Bluetooth Low Energy wireless technology due to be adopted in 2010.
• The USB-IF Personal Health Working Group defined a standard to ensure interoperability between personal health devices and consumer electronics products. Intel chaired this working group through the creation of the USB Personal Healthcare Device Class v1.0 specification.

Personal health records give individuals information to manage their own healthcare and improve communications with healthcare providers.

• Dossia, a consortium of large employers, is developing a secure framework so more than 2.5 million employees, dependents, and retirees can collect and maintain lifelong electronic health records. Intel is a founding member.

Medical information standards enable information to flow smoothly and securely throughout the complex healthcare system. These standards help improve efficiency and quality and reduce cost and complexity.

• Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology (CCHIT) is a voluntary, private-sector organization that is creating an efficient, credible, and sustainable certification program for interoperable products, with an initial focus on electronic medical records for office-based physicians or other providers.
• Clinical Data Interchange Standards Consortium (CDISC) develops and supports global data standards that improve medical research and related areas of healthcare. Intel is an active member.
• Health Level 7 (HL7) focuses on specifying international standards that enable disparate healthcare applications to exchange key sets of clinical and administrative data. Our solution architects help lead a number of committees and Charles Jaffe, MD, PhD, of Intel's Digital Health Group, is HL7's CEO.
• Healthcare Information Technology Standards Panel (HITSP) is a cooperative partnership between public and private sectors focused on integrating standards to meet clinical and business needs for sharing information among organizations and systems.
• Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE) is an initiative by healthcare professionals and industry to develop frameworks for open standards-based information exchange. Intel is an active member.