The California Association of Health Information Exchanges (CAHIE) and the National Association for Trusted Exchange (NATE) have announced that CAHIE will assume responsibility for administering the NATE Provider-to-Provider Direct Messaging Trust Bundle. NATE established the Provider-to-Provider Trust Bundle in November 2012 as the first national framework dedicated to facilitating Direct messaging among providers. The trust bundle currently enables exchange among organizations across the nation, including in California, Oregon, Utah, and Alaska.
In 2013, California state agencies overseeing HITECH funding transferred governance of statewide HIE to CAHIE. Since that time, CAHIE has successfully initiated a process for voluntary self-governance of information sharing across diverse organizational boundaries through adoption of common consensus policies, technical standards, and business practices. By collaborating with NATE and assuming administration of the Provider-to-Provider Direct messaging trust bundle, CAHIE is able to engage the larger healthcare ecosystem and expand its activities to enable information sharing among providers nationwide. This transition also allows NATE to refine its focus on broadening health information exchange with consumers.
As part of the agreement, CAHIE will convene a new national forum to establish consensus policies and procedures to manage and govern the new national provider trust bundle. The new trust bundle will use existing CAHIE and NATE policies and procedures as a foundation, and will include current participants in NATE’s Provider-to-Provider Trust Bundle and other interested stakeholders.
Ignatius Bau 