Membership: (§381.90, F.S.)
The council shall be composed of the following members or their senior
executive-level designees:
Secretary of the Department of Health (DOH)
Director of the Agency for Healthcare Administration (AHCA)
Attorney General (AG)
Secretary of the Department of Business and Professional Regulation (DBPR)
Secretary of the Department of Children and Families (DCF)
Secretary of the Department of Corrections (DC)
Commissioner of Education (DOE)
Secretary of the Department of Elder Affairs (DOEA)
State Treasurer/Insurance Commissioner (DOI)
Secretary of the Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ)
Executive Director of the Correctional Medical Authority (CMA)
Two Representatives of County Health Departments (CHD)
A Representative of Florida schools of public health chosen by the Board
of Regents (BOR)
A Representative of the Florida Association of Counties (FAC)
A Representative of the Florida Healthy Kids Corporation
Council Members in Attendance:
Dr. Michael Graven, representing University of South Florida, College
of Public Health
Debra Gressel, representing the Agency for Health Care
Administration
Dr. John Heilman, representing Pinellas County Health Department (via
conference call)
William P. "Bud" Johnston, representing the Department of
Elder Affairs
Cheryll Lesneski, representing Putnam County Health Department (via
conference call)
Linda Nelson, representing the Department of Health
Randy Niewenhous, representing Department of Children & Families
Council Members Absent:
Robert Anderson, representing the Attorney General's Office
Donald Bennett, representing the Correctional Medical Authority
Jim Bracher, representing the Department of Insurance
John Burke, representing the Department of Corrections
Lee Cornman, representing the Department of Business and Professional
Regulation
George Hinchliffe, representing the Department of Juvenile Justice
Cretta Johnson, representing the Florida Association of Counties
Ron McCord, representing the Commissioner of Education
Rose Naff, representing Florida Healthy Kids Corporation
Others in Attendance:
Allison H. Stachnik,
Accenture
Carolyn Turner, AHCA (SCHS)
Debbie Walters, AHCA (Health Policy)
Lori Schultz, DCF
Rosemary Erwin, DOH (MQA)
Robert Maiden, DOH (EMS)
Allen Pearman, DOH (IT)
George Schaffer, DOH (EMS)
Kim Shafer DOH (EMS)
Lee Stapp, DOH (IT)
I. Call to Order and Welcome:
Linda Nelson called the Florida Health Information Systems Council
meeting to order at 2:00 pm and welcomed participants.
II. Roll Call:
A formal roll call was conducted and attendees identified themselves and
the organization they represented. Attendance is reflected above. An
absence of a quorum was noted.
III. Approval of Minutes:
The minutes of the Florida Health Information Systems Council meeting
held September 5, 2001, were reviewed and two corrections noted (Page 6,
third paragraph, first and last sentences: modify text so that word is
"publicly" not "public ally"). No formal approval of
the minutes was made due to the absence of a quorum noted previously.
IV. Summary of Department of Health and Agency for Health Care
Administration review of all statutorily imposed reporting requirements
for health care practitioners and health facilities (as required by
Chapter 2001-277, Laws of Florida):
Deborah Walters presented a summary of the joint report prepared by the
Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) and the Department of
Health (DOH). The report reviewed all statutorily imposed reporting
requirements for health care practitioners and health facilities
administered by either AHCA or DOH. The report included recommendations
and suggested statutory changes to streamline reporting requirements to
avoid duplicative, overlapping, and unnecessary reports or data
elements.
Generally the report found that AHCA and DOH reporting requirements
were not duplicative, overlapping, or unnecessary. The report notes that
while some overlap may exist and that some required information may be
similar, information collected is not identical and in the current
environment of freestanding data bases, integration of all agency
reports is not possible at this time. The report further suggests that
the development of a fully integrated data warehousing system would be
both costly to both develop and maintain.
The report concludes with three recommendations:
· State agencies should continue to support data sharing and
coordination activities such as electronic data catalog; developed by
the State Center for Health Statistics (AHCA) · A formal mechanism
should be established to permit health care providers to bring specific
concerns about unnecessary duplication of data or reporting requirements
to the Florida Health Information Systems Council for review with
recommendations to issued to affected agencies as appropriate; and, ·
Health care providers should be encouraged to cooperate with State
agencies to promote data sharing and coordination between state and
federal programs.
V. HIPPA Status Report and Update--A presentation on the Third
National HIPAA Summit:
Linda Nelson presented a brief summary of the nature and scope of
sessions held at the Third National HIPAA Summit held in Washington D.
C. on October 25 and 26, 2001. She noted that the sessions provided
current information on the status and construction of the HIPAA
regulations through the presentations of the leading experts in the
field. In addition, the Summit provided focused coverage of important
Gramm-Leach-Bliley requirements. Finally, a number of sessions provided
specific and in depth analysis of the healthcare privacy and security
laws of a number of major states.
Ms. Nelson noted that even with all of information provided, a number
of questions remain unresolved with respect to addressing HIPAA
requirements in Florida. Also, presentations on the Gramm-Leach-Bliley
requirements raise additional issues related to HIPAA implementation and
the relationship between these two sets of federal regulations.
[Additional information on the summit and material from specific
summit sessions can be found at http://www.hipaasummit.com/overview.html.]
VI. Summary on Status of the HIPAA Rule Adoption and
Implementation of Agency Plans:
Representatives from a number of member agencies presented status
reports on HIPAA compliance efforts. Major activities identified
included the following:
· Agency for Health Care Administration HIPAA workgroup · Formation
of a number of internal workgroups within the various agencies affected
by HIPAA · Establishment of a HIPAA steering committee under the
auspices of the Executive Office of the Governor with lead staff
designated from the Office of Policy and Budget. · Adoption of an
approach, which involves decentralized implementation with centralized
oversight and monitoring of HIPAA related activities.
VII. Approval of charge to council informal workgroup to address
issues related to data extraction and merging for state sponsored
projects:
Allen Pearman began by noting that a conference call was held on
November 6, 2001, from 1-1:30 pm to draft a charge to the informal
workgroup to address issues related to data extraction and merging for
state sponsored projects. Participants included: Dr. Michael Graven (USF,
School of Public Health), Don Bennett (Correctional Medical Authority),
Ed Neu (Elder Affairs), and Allen Pearman (Department of Health, FHISC).
It was generally agreed that the scope of workgroup activities should
be limited to a review and evaluation of data extraction and merging
capabilities of existing data bases and steps that could be taken to
make use of existing data more timely and less costly for state
sponsored research projects or required data based program evaluations.
The scope does not include a review or analysis of the development of
merged databases for more general research purposes. Further, the
workgroup is to focus on the use of existing health related data (and is
not charged with identifying additional data needs).
The committee should include need identification, review of best
practices (of Florida agencies and other states), and review of current
capabilities as key components in any final work product present for
council consideration. The specific approach or methodology to address
these issues is to be determined by the workgroup.
It was further observed that multiple representatives might be
required from some agencies such as AHCA and DOH to ensure that
expertise and experience with specific databases are available to aid
the development of any workgroup product.
The specific time frame for workgroup activities and desired
completion dates for workgroup products was identified as an issue to be
addressed by the full council.
Since the workgroup functions informally and no final council actions
are taken by the group, a telephone conference call will be held (prior
to the next council meeting) to address outstanding issues including,
but not limited to, the time frame for development of workgroup products
and recommendations.
VIII. Health Data Reports--A Health Data Catalog/Directory:
Carolyn Turner from the Agency for Health Care Administration, State
Center for Health Statistics, provided a briefing on a health data
catalog developed by agency staff. The State Health Data Catalog was
developed to assist individuals searching for health data and
statistics. Its purpose is to facilitate referrals to the responsible
data administrator for detailed information regarding available data and
to promote the efficient use of data for research and public policy
purposes.
The creation of the catalog is authorized in s. 408.05(4)(g) Florida
Statutes.
There are currently 116 entries in the catalog representing various
health care related databases maintained by state agencies. Each
database entry is assigned to one of twelve categories.
Each entry contains information on the types of data collected,
reporting entities, purpose of the database with statutory or rule
references if applicable, and contact information. If available, web
site references are provided
The catalog may be sorted by category or by state agency with each
entry listed in alphabetical order by the program description. The
program description is the name of the function the database supports.
In some cases the program description and the name of the database are
equivalent.
The catalog will be updated periodically. Information is to be
current and checked for accuracy as of the date indicated on each
database entry in the catalog.
IX Health Data Reports--Status Report on Specific Health Data Sharing
Efforts Between State Agencies: "Bud" Johnson, Department of
Elder Affairs, raised an issue regarding the possible council role in
review and comment on proposed agency standards for electronic reporting
of data related to clients (or patients) by contracted providers. The
standards would provide the framework for electronic data interchange,
which would eliminate the re-keying of data at the local level.
It was tentatively agreed that the standards (4) developed by the
Department of Elder Affairs would be presented to the council for review
and comment and possible confirmation that proposed standards are not
inconsistent with the council's efforts to reduce barriers to health
related data sharing. The presentation and any council deliberations may
provide a basis for development of a model for responding to similar
requests in the future.
X. Other Business:
There being no other items to bring to the attention of the council, the
meeting adjourned at approximately 4:00 p.m.
.
Summary of Pending Action Items:
1. Take steps necessary to hold a conference call of the informal
workgroup to address issue related to data extraction and merging for
state sponsored projects and similar issues that might be addressed by
formally establishing and maintaining health related analytical data
sets. Conference call to be scheduled prior to next council
meeting
2. Take steps necessary to hold a telephone conference call meeting of
the council prior to the end of the calendar year. [Subsequently, a
telephone conference call was set up and notices for December 17, 2001,
from 1:00 to 3:00 p.m.]
