Senate Health & Welfare hears expert on building a statewide health data utility to support primary care and hospital budget reform

Andrea, a member of the Senate Health & Welfare Committee, opened the Feb. 27 session by introducing Craig, a consultant and former director of the Vermont Blueprint for Health, to continue testimony the committee had not finished earlier in the week.

Craig told the committee that states that have succeeded in statewide data aggregation treat the work as a program — a “data utility” — rather than purely a technology project, and that governance, financing and useful products for participating providers and payers are as important as technical capability. “Data moves at the speed of trust,” he said, arguing that sustained participation requires meaningful input from payers, providers and consumer representatives.

The consultant outlined several concrete elements he said guiding legislation or committee direction should address: require regular payer attribution rosters so practices and payers agree on who is responsible for each patient; make near–real-time claims feeds and clinical data available to build a longitudinal health record; permit linkage of identified…