Digital Health Action Collaborative
Fostering improvements and innovation in digital infrastructure so that health technology is developed and applied in ways that consistently lead to better population and patient-level health
As one of four action collaboratives under the National Academy of Medicine’s Leadership Consortium, the Digital Health Action Collaborative (DHAC) works to advance the digital infrastructure necessary for continuous improvement and innovation in health, health care, and evidence development.
While health technology emerges and improves at a rapid pace, strategic and equitable integration of new technology into the health system lags behind. The DHAC focuses on identifying, promoting, and encouraging interoperability of new technologies; guiding their entry into the health system as fully integrated digital platforms and tools for optimal health system performance; and promoting strategic sharing, linkage, and use of data produced or captured by these new technologies. Under the guidance of the Leadership Consortium, the DHAC takes the lead on positioning digital health infrastructure as a core utility for the common good.
Winter 2020 Update | Summer 2019 Update | Winter 2017 Update | Fall 2016 Update | Summer 2016 Update
Jonathan B. Perlin, MD, PhD (Co-Chair)
Reed Tuckson, MD (Co-Chair)
Action Collaborative Description
With more components—testing, diagnosis, records, and patient-clinician communication—shifting to digital platforms, there exists enormous potential for increasing the efficiency, convenience, and effectiveness of health care. Digitalizing health care processes and information provides the foundation necessary to drive a continuously improving health system in which knowledge from past events is used to guide decisions. A health information technology infrastructure that supports a continuously improving, learning health care system requires consideration of the capabilities, technical and policy approaches, and operating principles needed to allow data from multiple areas of clinical health care, population health, clinical, biomedical, and translational research to be leveraged while protecting patients’ privacy.
In 2010, the Institute of Medicine, with support from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, held a series of workshops to explore the current efforts and opportunities to accelerate progress in improving health and health care with information technology. The resulting report — Digital Infrastructure for the Learning Health System: The Foundation for Continuous Improvement in Health and Health Care — highlighted several areas for follow up activities in developing the digital infrastructure such as data stewardship, quality monitoring, research capabilities, and coordinating requirements around leadership, policies, and sustainability.
Participants include experts from public and private organizations with prominent activities and leadership responsibilities related to development and application of digital technology important to continuous improvement in health and health care. The aim is for an inclusive Collaborative—without walls—and participation in individual projects is structured according to interest, need, and practicality.
Organizations
- American Board of Pediatrics
- Children’s Hospital Boston
- Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
- Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin
- Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center
- Cleveland Clinic
- Duke University Health System
- Geisinger Health System
- Google, Inc.
- Harvard Medical School
- Harvard Pilgrim Health Care
- Hospital Corporation of America, Inc.
- IBM Research
- Intermountain Healthcare
- Johns Hopkins Children’s Center
- Kaiser Permanente
- Mayo Clinic
- Microsoft, Inc.
- Nationwide Chidren’s Hospital
- Nemours Children’s Healthcare System
- New York Presbyterian/Columbia
- NorthShore University Health System
- Partners HealthCare System
- Primary Children’s Medical Center
- Radiological Society of North America
- Seattle Children’s Hospital
- Stanford University
- Texas Children’s Hospital
- The Children’s Hospital-Denver
- TrustNetMD
- UC Davis Health System
- UCLA School of Medicine
- University of Alabama
- University of Chicago
- University of Michigan Medical School
- University of Vermont
- U.S. Department of Defense (Health Affairs)
- U.S. Department of Health & Human Services
- Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
- Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
- Food and Drug Administration
- Health Resources and Services Administration
- National Institutes of Health
- National Library of Medicine
- Office of the National Coordinator for HIT
- U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
- Vanderbilt University Medical Center
Activities
Projects completed, under way, or under consideration by the DHAC include:
- Workshop series and report on the Digital Infrastructure for the Learning Health System. Cooperative work involving DHAC participants with the Office of the National Coordinator and related government agencies to explore strategic considerations in accelerating learning from healthcare delivery.
- PEDSNet. A consortium of 15 leading pediatric care institutions, working together to create an organization providing networked clinical data from electronic health records for use in accelerating clinical research in pediatrics.
- Aligning health reform data needs and priorities. Engaging leaders from key federal health reform initiatives on strategies and opportunities to leverage health IT for program and monitoring alignment, across initiatives and in the support of population health.
- Data quality and learning from the digital health utility. Workshop to explore the data quality issues and strategies central to the increasing capture and use of digital clinical and patient-reported data for knowledge development.
Meetings
In-person attendance at meetings is by invitation only due to room capacity limitations. All meetings are available by webcast, and information on joining the webcast is available on the meeting event page as the meeting approaches.
Past Meetings:
For more information, contact LeadershipConsortium@nas.edu
