EHR Policy Engine for Cross-Organization Compliance Enforcement
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Solution Overview
Problem
Ensuring compliance with numerous state and federal regulations governing electronic health record (EHR) sharing across different healthcare organizations is difficult due to the complexity of updating each instance of EHR clients and APIs, especially with varying legal requirements based on location.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a policy engine that intercepts EHR requests and responses to apply and enforce compliance policies, modifying non-compliant requests and responses to ensure adherence to state and federal laws, using enrichment documents for patient consent information.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a policy engine is inserted between EHR clients and APIs to enforce compliance policies, then compliance with state and federal regulations is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
A policy engine is introduced as an intermediary component between EHR clients and APIs. This policy engine intercepts requests, applies compliance policies, modifies requests or responses as needed, and forwards them to the API. The policy engine acts as a mediator that enforces state and federal regulations without requiring modifications to existing clients or APIs, thereby improving compliance while maintaining a manageable system architecture through clear separation of concerns.
2Manufacturing precision
If policies are applied to each instance of EHR clients and APIs, then compliance accuracy is improved, but ease of manufacture deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The policy engine is designed as a universal, multi-functional component that can be deployed once to serve multiple EHR clients and APIs. Instead of implementing compliance logic in each individual client or API instance, the policy engine provides centralized policy enforcement that works across all connected systems. This universal approach ensures consistent compliance accuracy while significantly reducing deployment complexity, as the policy engine can be updated independently of the clients and APIs it serves.
Solution Approach 2:
By positioning the policy engine as an intermediary layer, the system achieves compliance accuracy without requiring modifications to each EHR client or API instance. The policy engine handles all policy enforcement centrally, making the system easier to manufacture and deploy. Updates to compliance policies can be applied to the policy engine without affecting the underlying clients or APIs, simplifying the deployment process while maintaining high compliance accuracy.
3Reliability
If the API is modified to enforce compliance policies, then compliance is improved, but adaptability deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The policy engine serves as an intermediary that enforces compliance policies without requiring modifications to the API itself. The API maintains its original design and flexibility, while the policy engine handles compliance enforcement by intercepting requests, applying policies, and modifying requests or responses as needed. This separation allows the API to remain adaptable and versatile, supporting various EHR clients and use cases, while compliance is enforced through the configurable policy engine that can be updated independently.
Data Source
AI summary
When a healthcare organization submits a request for EHRs on behalf of one or more patients, the policy engine may intercept the request and may determine whether the request complies with one or more policies. The policies may be created based on one or more state and Federal regulations and may relate to who is authorized to request EHRs for a particular patient and what information can be included in the EHRs. The policy engine may determine if the request complies with the policies, and if not, the policy engine may modify the request to comply with the policies and may hand off the modified request to the API.