Human Services Interoperability Innovations (HSII)

The ACF Human Services Interoperability Innovations (HSII) demonstration program is intended to expand data sharing efforts by state, local, and tribal governments to improve human services program delivery, and to identify novel data sharing approaches that can be replicated in other jurisdictions.

Grants will focus on addressing longstanding barriers to interoperability, including technology, business, legal, organizational, and process-oriented factors. Results will be disseminated to inform future efforts and facilitate replication of promising practices.

2022 - 2023

In December 2021, two HSII cooperative agreement grants were awarded:

Chesapeake Regional Information System for Our Patients (CRISP) will leverage enterprise infrastructure to enable data sharing that will match patient records and share 'care plans' related to patient health across states connecting the NJ-InCK care management system that is being customized to support the care management needs of approximately 15,000 of the highest risk kids and young adults in the Monmouth and Ocean County region of New Jersey.

As the state-designated health information exchange organization for Maryland and the District of Columbia, the New Jersey Integrated Care for Kids (NJ-InCK) represents a consortium of healthcare provider organizations and systems serving the needs of nearly 140,000 Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP)-enrolled children in New Jersey. CRISP will facilitate the exchange of a bi-directional care plan created by NJ-InCK within its case management system. This care plan can be accessed electronically by health care, administrative, and social support providers when children and young adults who suffer from opioid use disorder (OUD) present for services as they transition across care settings and states. Access to shared, structured care plans across state lines to coordinate the integration of clinical, social, and human service needs is critical to ensuring the health, wellbeing and recovery of children and mothers affected by OUD. 

The care plan is made available when children and mothers present for care in Maryland or the New Jersey region that NJ-InCK serves. The care coordination module will provide a dedicated space for access to a standardized care plan that will be created and maintained by the Maternal Opioid Misuse (MOM) case manager in Maryland for each participant with access to the InCK Care Plan from New Jersey.

Delaware School Based Health Alliance (SBHA) Data Interoperability and    Sharing Cooperative (DISCO) addresses technology, business, legal, organizational, and process-oriented factors that stand in the way of meaningful data use. It bridges administrative, clinical, and educational data needs across health and school systems to advance health equity among adolescents. SBHA will conduct and evaluate a demonstration project that aligns the recently adopted strategic plan for Delaware School-Based Health Centers (SBHCs). The SBHCs use the Apex SBHC Data Hub to provide interoperability across the national School Based Health Alliance (SBHA) network. The Apex SBHC Data Hub uses national standards to collect the data. Through this work, SBHA empowers a range of service providers as well as the students themselves to use data to advance equity among adolescents in Delaware. Moreover, the project sets the stage for scaling up a model of collaborative data integration, sharing, and actionable reporting that bridge education, health, and social systems.

Holistically, this project entails organizational coordination, technological sophistication, rigorous program evaluation, feasibility testing for replicability and scalability, as well as testing a new model of social enterprise to support sustainability.

2020 - 2021

Georgia State University achieved interoperability between Georgia’s Division of Family and Children Services’ units by using an approach already implemented in their school system, by using an open source, cloud-based hashing solution to match and link records. Georgia’s solution performs identity-matching functions without requiring a social security number for matching within units of DFCS as well as sister agencies. They are able to offer a free cloud-based solution for interoperability and data sharing that paves the way for smoother data sharing agreements and alleviates legal and privacy concerns.

The focus of research identifies risk factors of child maltreatment fatalities and comparisons of outcomes for children in foster care. Outcomes include reducing the numbers of child fatalities, assisting child welfare personnel in call centers and caseworkers with case management, and improving outcomes for children in care.

Kentucky’s Department for Medicaid Services created the Kentucky Health Information Data Sharing (KHIDS), which improves outcomes for youth in their child welfare system through enhanced data sharing. Kentucky connects multiple agencies serving youth in Kentucky creating an interoperable network of agencies to better meet their service needs. They connect health data with relevant data in other Departments of Kentucky to aid in case planning and management. These data includes a wide array of services, treatments and other interventions that children have received across departments, providing a more accurate picture of their current health status, assisting case workers. The connection also provides a secure, ongoing platform for continued data sharing. The project uses a data governance model, and a toolkit and measurement framework, for replication by other jurisdictions or agencies. The project combined the effort of creating multiple connections between different agencies and the Health Information Exchange. By doing this, they streamlined efforts, to improve youth outcomes related to health, reduce administrative burden and track and evaluate their programs and services, across agencies.

The Federal point of contact for this program is Joanna Thurston.