Expanding the Use of a Personal Health Record (PHR) System to California’s Foster Care Population

The State’s “Audacious Goal” “Improve quality and continuity of care for California’s foster children and long-term care patients using personal health record (PHR) technology to enable connectivity and information sharing across multiple care systems, provider types, and state and local health agencies.” [from State Medicaid HIT Plan ] Five year time horizon (8/2011 to 8/2016)

Project Overview 56,000 foster children in California – Underserved – Vulnerable – Complex health needs – Poor health outcomes Initiative: Develop Strategic Plan to implement “Audacious Goal” for children and youth in foster care – Tailor use of HIE – Integrated Personal Health Record (PHR) – Improve communication among Providers Caseworkers Families Youth

Project Partners The Children’s Partnership Follow Me Aspiranet AltrulT Believe Health UCSF School of Pharmacy Subject Matter Experts Community Stakeholders State Staff

Developing a Strategic Plan Develop a robust, useful PHR system that reaches all children and youth in foster care and their caregivers Exchange data across unaffiliated organizations, distinct EHRs and the PHR Populate individual’s PHRs with information automatically downloaded from available electronic resources – Medi-Cal claims data – Immunization records – State public health and child welfare data Facilitate State efforts to strengthen oversight of psychotropic medication use among children and youth in foster care Do the above consistent with State and ONC and Privacy & Security directives.

Strategic Plan Will identify and recommend Core functions and Design features that will best serve the needs of this unique population. Establish the steps required to develop the PHR system, link it to broader state HIE initiatives, and take it to scale as part of a fully interoperable data exchange system for the state’s foster care population.

For more information, contact Ginny Puddefoot, The Children’s Partnership Director, Health IT Initiatives for Vulnerable Youth,