What You Should Know:
- Manifest MedEx (MX), California’s largest nonprofit Qualified Health Information Organization (QHIO), is launching the California ADT Network — a no-cost, electronic ADT notification exchange — to help organizations exchange ADT data in compliance with the DxF and to substantially scale the sharing of ADT alerts across the state.
- California hospitals, health systems, skilled nursing facilities (SNFs), and QHIOs participating in the DxF can now sign on to the California ADT Network to securely send and receive basic ADT notifications for free to improve patient care and help meet DxF data sharing requirements — without any requirement to join the broader MX network or access other products and data services from the QHIO, such as longitudinal patient records and claims data.
Revolutionizing Healthcare Communication with Free ADT Exchange
ADTs, which stand for Admission, Discharge, and Transfer notifications, are concise electronic messages typically dispatched by either a hospital or a Skilled Nursing Facility’s (SNF) electronic health record (EHR) system. These notifications serve the purpose of informing an assigned physician and care team about their patient’s movement within the healthcare system, such as admission to a care facility, discharge, or transfer to another setting. These push notifications play a crucial role in facilitating timely care coordination, thereby reducing the likelihood of avoidable hospital readmissions, enhancing patient outcomes, and mitigating overall healthcare expenses.
As part of their obligations under the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) programs, hospitals are mandated to transmit ADT notifications to community providers. Additionally, a legal requirement mandates most California hospitals to comply with this regulation by January 31, 2024. Similarly, SNFs are encouraged to adhere to the January 2024 deadline by sending ADT notifications to DxF participants. The implementation of a free, bi-directional ADT exchange facilitated by Manifest MedEx eliminates financial obstacles for DxF participants and simplifies the mandated data sharing process. This exchange mechanism facilitates the seamless transmission of ADT notifications among hospitals, SNFs, and Qualified Health Information Organizations (QHIOs), thereby supporting their care teams who opt to receive alerts pertinent to their patients. Ultimately, these efforts serve to benefit the patients involved.
“Removing the pay to play cost barriers that exist today, making more ADTs accessible while protecting patient privacy, and getting them to the right care team — especially in critical access, rural, and under-resourced areas — is fundamental to creating the digital health data safety net we need in California,” said Erica Galvez, CEO, Manifest MedEx. “The California ADT Network will rapidly accelerate California’s ability to positively transform health equity, public health, and Medi-Cal outcomes, which rely on robust and seamless health data sharing among all providers.”