Some 71 percent of U.S. hospitals plan to purchase new health information exchange (HIE) solutions, according to findings from the new "2012 U.S. Health Information Exchange Study" released Friday. 

The study, commissioned by the healthcare technology research firm CapSite, includes insight from more than 370 hospitals on the market adoption, marketshare, market opportunity and vendor perspectives across the U.S. hospital industry.

The numbers this year are down slightly from last year’s report, which found 74 percent of U.S. hospitals planning to purchase a new HIE solution. 

[See also: Nearly one-fifth of hospitals plan to replace their LIS.]

Study findings also highlight that 25 percent of hospitals planning to purchase these solutions will do so within a seven-to-12 month time period.  

“Our study shows that half the hospitals in the U.S. have now joined a private, state or regional HIE," says CapSite senior vice president and general manager, Gino Johnson. "This is an increase from our 2011 HIE Study, where we found a third of hospitals had joined an HIE."

“Additionally, we expect the market adoption of HIE technologies to continue to accelerate over the next two years as provider organizations move towards Stage 2 of Meaningful Use,” said Johnson.

Hospitals participating in the study also provided insight on strategies for accountable care transition, e-prescribing, patient portals, immunization reporting, referrals and image viewing.  

Vendors involved in the study include: Allscripts, Carefx, Cerner, Covisint, CPSI, dbMotion, Dr. First, eClinicalWorks, Epic, GE Healthcare, Healthland, HMS, ICA, IGI Health, InteHealth, InterSystems, Keane, McKesson, Meditech, Medicity, MedPlus, MEDSEEK, Microsoft, MobileMD, NextGen, OptumInsight, Orion Health, Prognosis, RelayHealth, Siemens, Verizon and Wellogic.