New York City Health Alert Network (HAN) Dale Rosenberg Department of Health and Mental Hygiene

Health Alert Network  Funded by CDC under BT Grant  Method for alerting public health officials in case of urgent public health issues  Grants given to 50 states and largest cities  Each HAN independently developed and implemented  Some coordination nationally, with a goal of eventual integration

NYC HAN – What is it?  Web-based repository of information on urgent and emergent public health issues  Alerts from CDC, DOHMH, and other sources  Document library on public health issues  Online community to exchange ideas

NYC HAN – What is it?  Provides flexible security to restrict access to some information  Low barriers to entry to public areas, high barriers to secure areas  Ability to send patient pictures and other sensitive data securely

NYC HAN – What is it?  Web-based HAN is “pull” method; Supplemented with “push” alerting  Dialogic Communicator NxT allows for sending s en masse, as well as faxing and calling participants  Premier Global Services messageReach and faxReach products for backup

NYC HAN – why this approach?  Can reach providers quickly in an emergency  Redundant capabilities in case normal means of communication are not available  “Dual use”  By providing info that is used on an ongoing basis, we hope to make the HAN somewhere providers are accustomed to go and will know to look to in an emergency  You can access HAN from anywhere

You can access HAN from anywhere!

NYS and NYC  DOHMH and DOH?  HAN, HIN, HPN?  Why so many systems?  How do they relate?  Where should providers in NYC turn?

NYC and NYS Comparison of Systems FunctionNYC DOHMHNYS DOH Provider Access to Health Alerts HAN –website and HAN – website only Public Health Info for Providers HANHPN Disseminating info to local health departments N/AHIN Online community for providers HANN/A Provider Portal to Department Applications NYC MEDHPN

Where are we now? - Pull  HAN launched in February 2003  17,000 DOHMH and Medical Provider Subscribers  All hospitals represented  Specialized secure areas for Weapons of Mass Destruction Advisory Group, Diabetes and Depression Collaboratives, DOHMH On Call Physicians, Pandemic Flu, CRI, IMS Liaisons  Document library has thousands of documents from a variety of sources  VisualDx Software for diagnostic support  NYCMED portal allows for single sign on to all DOHMH provider applications

Where are we now? – Push  Dialogic and Premier Global web-based broadcast alert system  Alerts sent out via and fax  Can send from anywhere  On Call Staff 24x7  Alerts sent within 2 hours  Weekly “Recently on the HAN” s

Where are we going?  More content in HAN Document Library  More applications – training and others  Conferencing feature revisions to improve user-friendliness  Increase user base – market to hospitals and non-hospital-based providers  Increase web site usage – most HAN subscribers only use alerting

How to Get On the HAN  DOHMH employees have automatic access, must use tokens to log in  External medical providers go to and register. It only takes a few minutes  Any problems registering or logging in? Call NYCMED9

Questions or Comments?  Call Dale Rosenberg, HAN Coordinator  Call NYCMED Help Desk Line NYCMED9  Write to or