Apple is moving ahead with tests to try out a new digital health API that will make it easier to access patient claims.
The new initiative was announced at this year’s Blue Button Developers Conference. Apple will be testing the new API from CARIN that will automatically integrate claim data from patient health records directly into software like Apple’s stock Health app.
After many months of work, today the private sector released the CARIN Blue Button® data model and draft implementation guide as part of the White House Blue Button® Developers Conference. The CARIN Blue Button® draft implementation guide includes more than 240 claim data elements that have been agreed on by multiple regional and national health plans. These data elements are included in what we are calling the common payer consumer data set or CPCDS. We have taken these data elements and mapped them to HL7® FHIR® resources to better assist health plans implement the CMS Interoperability and Patient Access proposed rule.
CARIN is a private company, but it has been chosen by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to be the center point for testing. CMMS launched Blue Button 2.0 in 2018, designed to offer 44 million “Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries digital access to their historical claims information through an application of their choice”.
Apple’s own Ricky Bloomfield, MD, is the point-of-contact for Apple as it moves ahead with its own testing for the digital health API. CARIN plans to launch the new API sometime in 2020, but no specific date has been nailed down just yet.