WASHINGTON, Jan. 23, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- DirectTrust today announced continued steady growth in the number of health care organizations using DirectTrust interoperability services during 2018, as well as an upsurge in the number of Direct message transactions, patient use, and addresses. DirectTrust is a non-profit health care industry alliance created to support secure, identity-verified electronic exchanges of personal health information (PHI) between provider organizations, and between provider and patients, for the purpose of improved coordination of care.
According to year-end 2018 metrics:
- There were nearly 274 million Direct message transactions between DirectTrust addresses in 2018, an 63% increase over the 2017 total of 168 million transactions. There were more than 110 million Direct messages transmitted during the fourth quarter of 2018 alone.
- The number of patients/consumers involved using Direct increased approximately 35% to nearly 248,000.
- The number of health care organizations served by DirectTrust accredited health information service providers (HISPs) increased 30% to nearly 139,000, compared with approximately 107,000 at year-end 2017.
- The number of trusted DirectTrust addresses able to share PHI across the DirectTrust network increased 16% to more than 1.8 million since the end of 2017.
- DirectTrust’s national network now includes 5 Governmental Trust Anchor Bundle HISPs; 36 Accredited Trust Anchor Bundle HISPs; and 38 DirectTrust-EHNAC accredited HISPs.
- Eleven healthcare organizations joined DirectTrust during 2018, bringing the organization’s total membership to 115.
“The trends that emerged in 2018 are becoming more pronounced and growth more broad-based,” said Scott Stuewe, DirectTrust President and CEO. “During the fourth quarter, nearly all DirectTrust accredited member organizations experienced growth in both transactions and the number of messages per address. This demonstrates an increase in the adoption of Direct Secure Messaging for transitions of care, and for other care coordination and population health purposes. As we move into 2019, we’re convening our EHR company members to identify new ways to improve the adoption of Direct Secure Messaging Workflows. We’re excited by the potential for even more rapid growth as our membership identifies opportunities for improvement.”
Charts detailing 2018 results are available here or by contacting Ed Emerman at eemerman@eaglepr.com.
About DirectTrust
DirectTrust is a six-year old, non-profit, competitively neutral, self-regulatory entity initially created by and for participants in the Direct exchange community, including Health Internet Service Providers (HISPs), Certificate Authorities (CAs), Registration Authorities (RAs), doctors, patients and vendors. DirectTrust supports both provider-to-provider and patient-to-provider Direct exchange. In the period 2013 to 2015, DirectTrust was the recipient of a Cooperative Agreement Award from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) as part of the Exemplar HIE Governance Program. DirectTrust serves as a forum and governance body for persons and entities engaged in the Direct exchange of electronic health information as part of the Nationwide Health Information Network (NwHIN). DirectTrust's Security and Trust Framework is the basis for the voluntary accreditation of service providers implementing Direct health information exchange. The goal of DirectTrust is to develop, promote, and, as necessary, help enforce the rules and best practices necessary to maintain security and trust within the Direct community, consistent with the HITECH Act and the governance rules for the NwHIN established by ONC. DirectTrust is committed to fostering widespread public confidence in the interoperable exchange of health information. To learn more, visit www.directtrust.org.
Contact
Ed Emerman
Eagle Public Relations
609.275.5162
eemerman@eaglepr.com