256873 Omaha System in Minnesota: Innovations in policy

Tuesday, October 30, 2012 : 2:30 PM - 2:50 PM

Diane Thorson, MS, RN, PHN , Public Health, Otter Tail County Public Health, Fergus Falls, MN
Karen S. Martin, RN, MSN, FAAN , Martin Associates, Omaha, NE
Karen A. Monsen, PhD RN , School of Nursing, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN
  
     
Background and Issues: Minnesota statutes mandated local health departments to have inter-operable electronic health records (EHR) systems by January, 2015. In 2010, a Health Information Exchange (HIE) Work Group of the Minnesota State Community Health Services Advisory Committee was charged with recommending standardized methods for exchanging local public health data

Description: HIE Work Group members studied other states' interoperability efforts, examined local public health's maternal and child health (MCH) business processes, and researched EHR and data exchange standards. They built a data dictionary for person-centric services for Family/Targeted Home visiting programs by conducting on-site business analysis sessions with LPH staff to define workflow processes and data exchange elements. Common exchanges and processes were then derived and vetted to provide a basis for recommending standards.

Lessons Learned: The HIE Work Group found that Omaha System was used widely to document public health interventions and population health outcomes by Minnesota local public health agencies. Knowledge of the Omaha System among Minnesota policy makers had increased due to widespread dissemination of outcome reports from practice agencies. State department of health staff, county commissioners, and local public health department directors valued the ability to describe public health interventions and population health outcomes.

Recommendations: The HIE Work Group recommended that the state utilize evidence based practices and methodologies for reporting for population outcomes using data standards. A recommended strategy was to establish the Omaha System as a client care documentation standard and to use the standardized data for annual reporting where possible.

Learning Areas:
Administration, management, leadership
Communication and informatics
Public health or related nursing
Public health or related organizational policy, standards, or other guidelines
Public health or related public policy

Learning Objectives:
1. Explain policy decisions influencing the expanded use of the Omaha System to capture information for community assessment and grant reporting. 2. Describe a community level case study to capture policy, system, and environmental changes related to addressing the obesity epeidemic.

Keywords: Community Health Assessment, Information Systems

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have been the principle or co-principle of development of policies for utilization of the Omaha System within public health departments in our agency and within Minnesota.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

Back to: 4344.0: Use of the Omaha System to Improve Population Health Research