Expanded partnership between Cleveland Clinic and CVS targets EHR interoperability

The Cleveland Clinic and CVS Health have expanded an eight-year partnership aimed at improving care for patients in Ohio and Florida to include enhanced data-sharing capabilities and EHR interoperability.

The two organizations launched a clinical affiliation in 2011 in an effort to increase access to care through CVS Minute Clinics. The expanded partnership, announced on Tuesday, takes aim at expanding data-sharing capabilities to enhance care coordination and population health efforts targeting chronic disease management.

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CVS Health will join Cleveland Clinic’s Quality Alliance, allowing the two organizations to share protocols and quality metrics and analyze population health data “through integrated, secured systems.”

“The ability to share information, quality measures and protocols will reduce chronic disease and ultimately improve our patients' quality of life,” Hermann Stubbe, M.D., chairman of the Cleveland Clinic Florida Department of Family Medicine, said in an announcement.

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EHR interoperability—which has become a priority for federal regulators— will be a focal point of the partnership, with an emphasis on coordinating alerts and messages about patient prescriptions between Cleveland Clinic physicians and CVS MinuteClinics and pharmacies.

CVS Health CIO Stephen J. Gold has said innovation is his top priority since joining the company in 2012, adding that prescription data is critical to providers that partner with retail clinics.

Cleveland Clinic and CVS have developed a close working partnership over the years. Last year the two organizations teamed up to offer virtual visits with Cleveland Clinic physicians at CVS MinuteClinics in Ohio.