Health Information Exchange: Understanding the Policy Landscape and Future of Data Interoperability

Findings from the 2023 Yearbook Section on Health Information Exchange

OBJECTIVES

To summarize the recent literature and research and present a selection of the best papers published in 2022 related to Health Information Exchange (HIE).

METHODS

A systematic review of the literature was performed by the two section editors with the help of a medical librarian. We searched bibliographic databases for HIE-related papers using both MeSH headings and keywords in titles and abstracts. A shortlist of ten candidate best papers was first selected by section editors before being peer-reviewed by Yearbook editors and independent external reviewers.

RESULTS

Major themes of the set of ten articles included factors influencing the organizational adoption of HIE and clinicians' use of the information, use of HIE in non-traditional settings, patients' perspectives on HIE, and outcomes of using HIE.

CONCLUSIONS

These studies provide suggestions for the research questions, theories, settings, methods, and outcomes that can be fruitfully used for further research on HIE.

Informatics for One Health

OBJECTIVES

To introduce the 2023 International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA) Yearbook by the editors.

METHODS

The editorial provides an introduction and overview to the 2023 IMIA Yearbook where the special topic is "Informatics for One Health". The special topic, survey papers and some best papers are discussed. The section changes in the Yearbook editorial committee are also described.

RESULTS

IMIA Yearbook 2023 provides many perspectives on a relatively new topic called "One Digital Health". The subject is vast, and includes the use of digital technologies to promote the well-being of people and animals, but also of the environment in which they evolve. Many sections produced new work in the topic including One Health and all sections included the latest themes in many specialties in medical informatics.

CONCLUSIONS

The theme of "Informatics for One Health" is relatively new but the editors of the IMIA Yearbook have presented excellent and thought-provoking work for biomedical informatics in 2023.