LAS VEGAS – Healthcare communication technology vendor etherFAX LLC and secure messaging systems company DataMotion have announced at HIMSS16 a partnership to deliver secure messaging and document delivery solutions for the healthcare industry. The companies have integrated etherFAX with DataMotion Direct to enable healthcare professionals to send and receive fax documents and other protected health information securely, ensuring privacy and compliance using the Direct Messaging standard.

The vendors are demonstrating the new technology at the 2016 Annual HIMSS Conference and Exhibition in Las Vegas, etherFAX in booth #12247 and DataMotion in booth #12144.

Technology from etherFAX enables secure transmission of unstructured data between fax servers, devices, electronic health records systems and health care information exchanges, with end-to-end encryption. Unstructured data such as medical notes, authorizations, protected health information and color documents can be transmitted at high speeds.

DataMotion Direct, part of the DataMotion platform, enables healthcare providers to send and receive protected health information with other Direct address holders to comply with HIPAA, enhance health information exchange, meet meaningful use requirements and enhance care coordination communications, the vendor said. Based on the national encryption standard for securely exchanging clinical healthcare data via the Internet, DataMotion Direct enables secure messaging for healthcare providers, patients, business associates and clinical systems, the vendor added.

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The new combined technology expands the connected reach of Direct Messaging to the large number of providers reliant on fax technology for exchanging patient information with other care providers and facilities, the vendors said.

“Fax remains a mainstay technology in healthcare, partly as a holdover from the era of paper-based medical records and partly due to HIPAA regulations preventing unsecure electronic communication like e-mail,” DataMotion chief technology officer Bob Janacek said. “Direct messaging overcomes HIPAA risks and other interoperability issues that have held back electronic communication in healthcare. Its adoption has accelerated with more than 40 million Direct messages sent in 2015. Integrating Direct messaging with fax will increase the adoption of Direct and we expect to see more integration into clinical workflows and EHRs as a result.”

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