The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) held a Health Information Exchange (HIE) workgroup on February 12, 2010, releasing more information about the development of the HIE Collaborative. AHCA confirmed that they will be releasing a Request for Information (RFI) in the near future for planning for operations of the state-level Health Information Organization (HIO) and the HIE Request for Proposals (RFP) that the HIO will issue with AHCA later this year. The RFP is expected to be released in August with a contract award in October.

Included in the presentation materials was a draft copy of the RFI, describing the basics that the Florida Health Information Network (FHIN) will be looking for. At a minimum, FHIN should be able to support more efficient coordination of patient care through faster delivery of pharmacy, laboratory, and other results to clinicians and allow for improved exchanges of patients' health information during transitions of care. The implemented HIE should function seamlessly with already existing public health organizations and conform to meaningful use criteria. The HIE will need to interface with not only the Medicaid Health Information Network (HIN), but also connections outside Florida to other entities connected to the Nationwide Health Information Network. AHCA estimates that technical funding for the FHIN will not exceed $4 million in the first year with a $6 million limit for year two of implementation. They are estimating responses for the RFI will be due by March 31, 2010. Time between the RFP release date and estimated contract award date is under two months, so vendors should make sure to familiarize themselves with the Draft RFI and released FHIN documents. Workgroup materials and the Draft RFI can be found on INPUT's Florida Health Information Technology Vertical page or on Opportunity ID #51791.