WEDI mulls new role in administering standards maintenance groups

Designated Standards Maintenance Organizations may play a key role in maintaining the HIPAA transaction standards.

Now, the Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange, which works to improve health information exchange, care quality and efficiency while cutting costs, may want to take on a new function and administer DSMOs, said Charles Stellar, CEO of WEDI, during HIMSS19.



A DSMO provides services for healthcare entities to process change requests related to HIPAA transactions and code sets. Members of the DSMO evaluate change requests, determine the impact a request may have on current HIPAA transactions and decide if the change is beneficial or that a change is not necessary.

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“We want to know what will be the role of a DSMO and where there could be better coordination for initiatives around administrative simplification, claims payment, and the CAQH and the CORE programs,” Stellar explained. “We may want to administer DSMOs to evaluate needed standards and the people, functions and talent to administer it.”

Stellar also wants to tell officials at the Department of Health and Human Services that HHS should fund DSMOs to help organizations build programs that let providers create their own DSMOs.

“We want to make sure that as organizations develop DSMOs that we are there to help them enhance data exchange,” he adds. “Hopefully, that will facilitate better and faster data exchange.”