As part of the overarching US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) re-design of the electronic clinical measure testing and certification process, a National Test Bed (NTB) has been proposed to expand clinical measure testing methods while also incorporating earlier and more frequent engagement across a broader range of stakeholders throughout the clinical measure development process. The NTB concept originated from the CMS/ONC LEAN Kaizen event held in late January 2013 where key stakeholders across the healthcare industry worked collaboratively to analyze the current state of clinical measure testing and certification and begin conceptualizing a more viable future state. The energized collaboration exhibited during the Kaizen event across HHS leadership, EHR vendors, standards organizations and measure developers fostered continued post-Kaizen work in this area via the formation of the Measure Testing and Certification Workgroup and the NTB subgroup.
Mario Hyland (@interopguy), Senior Vice President at AEGIS, participated throughout the entire week to tackle the multitude of challenges presented to this forum. The snow storm that hit the east coast this week made it interesting! But the Kaizen event was once again a great success. On Thursday, Mario was given the opportunity to present the advancements of the AEGIS Developers Integration Lab (DIL) Global Testing Platform for Health IT to the attendees as a viable platform currently being utilized by industry. It was well received by the group and a number of follow up discussions about the role(s) the DIL could play are being planned.