Comment by September 1, 2024. On July 10, The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC), released the Health Data, Technology, and Interoperability: Patient Engagement, Information Sharing, and Public Health Interoperability (HTI-2) proposed rule for public comment. The HTI-2 proposed rule has two sets of new certification criteria designed to enable health IT for public health as well as health IT for payers to be certified under the ONC Health IT Certification Program. These new certification criteria, which would improve public health response and advance the delivery of value-based care, focuses heavily on standards-based application programming interfaces to improve end-to-end interoperability between data exchange health care providers and public health organizations or payers. This rule also establishes the standards and implementation of a new, real-time prescription benefit tool certification criterion, which would empower providers and their patients to make more informed decisions with more transparent information comparing the patient-specific cost of drugs and suitable alternatives. In addition, the proposed rule also updates policy within the HTI-1 final rule published January 2024 related to the exchange of conical images and information blocking.
