The Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement™ (TEFCA) was created to connect Health Information Networks (HIN) that operate disparately across the United States to support the nationwide sharing of health data. TEFCA seeks to streamline the digital flow of health data between providers and patients.
Since TEFCA went live in December 2023, eight (8) organizations have been designated as Qualified Health Information Networks (QHINs): eHealth Exchange, Epic Nexus, Health Gorilla, Konza, MedAllies, Kno2, commonwell, and eClinicalWorks. Each QHIN is an extensive information network that represents hundreds of HINs, health systems, public health agencies, payers, and IT vendors.
Epic Nexus has announced that it plans to onboard the “full Epic community” to TEFCA by the end of 2025. Epic maintains an estimated 280 million patient records, which it would bring to the exchange.
Carequality (a large interoperability network) also announced in August 2024 that it would be aligning its framework with TEFCA, indicating that a consensus in the health data industry may be building in support of the TEFCA framework.
TEFCA’s growth will be further supported by regulatory measures to incentivize network participation. For example, HHS’ final rule addressing a new exception to the Information Blocking Rule now excludes TEFCA participants (called “actors”) from being found in violation of information blocking rules when they limit the manner in which they fulfill requests for information only to TEFCA.[1] This exception is only applicable if both the requestor and the actor are part of TEFCA.
Between the joining by giants in the medical data industry, and an effort by the government to streamline rules for TEFCA participants, it’s likely that the network should see a meaningful uptick in adoption in 2025.
Sources:
- https://www-cnbc-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2024/08/16/epic-systems-customers-will-use-tefca-to-exchange-health-records-.html
- https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/health-tech/recent-moves-epic-carequality-mark-major-shift-interoperability-health-it-experts-say
- https://www.healthit.gov/topic/interoperability/policy/trusted-exchange-framework-and-common-agreement-tefca
- https://rce.sequoiaproject.org/designated-qhins/
- 89 FR 101772
[1] 45 CFR 171.403
