Health Information Exchange (HIE) is the use of electronic medical records and e-prescribing to assist medical providers in understanding a patient’s full medical history. HIE enables the exchange of clinical and administrative data among providers to; improve healthcare quality and outcomes, reduce health disparities, reduce medical errors and duplicative services, enhance coordination of patient care among providers, reduce or eliminate paper and control the cost of healthcare.

HCI was one of Sixteen (16) Medical Trading Areas in Illinois have been identified by careful data analysis to address localized planning needs and assure rapid and effective planning for the implementation of HIE projects. The ultimate goal of the planning grants is to secure the commitment of a majority of stakeholder groups (e.g. physicians, hospitals, clinics, etc.) within each Medical Trading Area to participate in a health information exchange that will operate as a component of a state-level health information exchange in the future. HCI was successful in obtaining funding from the Chicago Community Trust to further reach providers in MTA 14 to inform of this new and exciting venture.