A national survey of digital health company experiences with electronic health record application programming interfaces.

OBJECTIVES

This study sought to capture current digital health company experiences integrating with electronic health records (EHRs), given new federally regulated standards-based application programming interface (API) policies.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

We developed and fielded a survey among companies that develop solutions enabling human interaction with an EHR API. The survey was developed by the University of California San Francisco in collaboration with the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, the California Health Care Foundation, and ScaleHealth. The instrument contained questions pertaining to experiences with API integrations, barriers faced during API integrations, and API-relevant policy efforts.

RESULTS

About 73% of companies reported current or previous use of a standards-based EHR API in production. About 57% of respondents indicated using both standards-based and proprietary APIs to integrate with an EHR, and 24% worked about equally with both APIs. Most companies reported use of the Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources standard. Companies reported that standards-based APIs required on average less burden than proprietary APIs to establish and maintain. However, companies face barriers to adopting standards-based APIs, including high fees, lack of realistic clinical testing data, and lack of data elements of interest or value.

DISCUSSION

The industry is moving toward the use of standardized APIs to streamline data exchange, with a majority of digital health companies using standards-based APIs to integrate with EHRs. However, barriers persist.

CONCLUSION

A large portion of digital health companies use standards-based APIs to interoperate with EHRs. Continuing to improve the resources for digital health companies to find, test, connect, and use these APIs "without special effort" will be crucial to ensure future technology robustness and durability.