HIMSS Analytics launched its Continuity of Care Maturity Model, or CCMM, Tuesday morning at HIMSS14. The seven-stage global model, which aligns with the HIMSS Analytics Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model (EMRAM), tracks the integration, coordination, sharing and usage of information between providers, government, individuals and others, with an eye to enhanced care delivery and improved patient outcomes.

“This model is evolving,” said John Hoyt, executive vice president of HIMSS Analytics. “It’s 90 percent complete, but we’re still receiving input from around the world.”

The model follows existing EMRAM methodology, Hoyt explained, consisting of eight stages (0 to 7), with a set of required capabilities at each stage. HIMSS Analytics engaged with providers and vendors throughout the development process, with reviewers in the United States and Europe. The model underwent three rounds of external assessments combined with internal feedback, which resulted in the development of a questionnaire and an algorithm.

“We don’t create these models in a vacuum,” Hoyt said. “It follows the existing EMRAM paradigm, but there is a difference in our philosophy and strategy. When we created the EMRAM models, all the software that was referenced in the models was available somewhere. That’s not the case with this model. It’s forward-looking, with global applicability.”

The primary target audiences for the model are integrated delivery networks (IDN) and national ministries of health, Hoyt noted. Categories addressed within the CCMM include organizational strategy; IT system capabilities; standards and interoperability frameworks; health information exchange; patient care coordination; patient/consumer engagement and empowerment; and advanced analytics.

Hoyt said HIMSS Analytics intends for the CCMM to “push the market,” providing thought leadership that would help health systems “gauge their progress towards a more efficient care delivery approach.”

“We want to incorporate the good things we see in various places around the world,” he said, noting the important example of mature data repositories used by the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Alberta.

One target of the CCMM is a “community-wide patient record,” bridging stages five through six, which Hoyt said could include “open notes and completely coordinated care.”

HIMSS Analytics intends to launch a pilot data-gathering model and finalize the CCMM based on the pilot results.

Initial reaction from the industry has been positive. Dominick Bizzarro, managing director for InterSystems HealthShare, said his company "strongly supports" the view that the "most connected, most knowledge-intensive providers will achieve the best healthcare outcomes."

“HIMSS Analytics has defined a vision for continuity of care that rests on a strategic underpinning of interoperability and analytics," Bizzarro said.

Michael Oppenheim, MD, Chief Medical Information Officer at North Shore-LIJ, said CCMM could provide the tools to automatically detect and notify providers of gaps in care or clinical changes, even when the patient is not right in front of the provider. "This will enable our providers to proactively intervene and should dramatically improve the health and well being of the people that we serve,” he said.