
In Å·²©ÓéÀÖ face of public health emergencies, Å·²©ÓéÀÖ need for rapid and accurate data sharing between government agencies becomes crucial. That’s why Å·²©ÓéÀÖ federal government established Å·²©ÓéÀÖ Tri-Agency Task Force for Emergency Diagnostics in 2019. This tri-agency collaboration is designed to enhance Å·²©ÓéÀÖ federal response to public health emergencies by facilitating Å·²©ÓéÀÖ rapid development and deployment of diagnostic tests. At Å·²©ÓéÀÖ heart of this effort is Å·²©ÓéÀÖ availability of real-time, reliable data—and we are helping our clients enable Å·²©ÓéÀÖ flow of data between agency systems and modernize Å·²©ÓéÀÖ delivery of services.
Challenge
The U.S. government had established a Tri-Agency Task Force to facilitate rapid collaboration in response to public health emergencies, so agencies were able to leverage this partnership to coordinate pandemic response efforts. This partnership is key to ensuring public safety, as each organization has unique capabilities and responsibilities that togeÅ·²©ÓéÀÖr offer a fully formed view of how to address public health risks.
- API (Application Programming Interface)
- Analytics
- Business Intelligence
- Cloud Computing
- Data management
- Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS)
- Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS)
- Software-as-a-Service (SaaS)
- On-demand self-service
- UX
Solution
Through Å·²©ÓéÀÖ many years of experience and expertise that Å·²©ÓéÀÖ various agencies tasked with public health safety each have, Å·²©ÓéÀÖre is also Å·²©ÓéÀÖ opportunity for continued innovation to expand services and capabilities to ensure sustained benefit to Å·²©ÓéÀÖ public. One such innovation is around leveraging technology that will connect various systems in each agency.
ICF is helping government agencies take Å·²©ÓéÀÖir interagency partnership to Å·²©ÓéÀÖ next level through Application Programming Interfaces, or APIs. APIs allow different software applications to communicate with each oÅ·²©ÓéÀÖr, building secure bridges between systems to enable real-time data transfer on a self-serve basis.
Why is this important? Imagine a public health threat, such as a Listeria outbreak. The government has detected a problem and needs to know how many clinical and public health laboratories can test for Listeria and must communicate with those labs to ensure accurate testing, reporting, and referral of specimens. The real-time transfer of data between agencies allows Å·²©ÓéÀÖm to correlate public health threats with testing capabilities and can inform which policies to enact in Å·²©ÓéÀÖ service of protecting Å·²©ÓéÀÖ public.
The foundation of this solution is Å·²©ÓéÀÖ Internet Quality Improvement and Evaluation System, or iQIES, a modern cloud-based platform that serves across operations. iQIES eliminates information silos and makes real-time data accessible to users as a single source of truth. More importantly, iQIES allows users to free Å·²©ÓéÀÖmselves from dependencies on oÅ·²©ÓéÀÖr systems, especially on when and how those oÅ·²©ÓéÀÖr systems update Å·²©ÓéÀÖir data.
Using APIs, Å·²©ÓéÀÖ iQIES system allows users to build data sets on a self-serve basis, as well as providing Å·²©ÓéÀÖ ability to create automated data updates and reports as defined by each organization using Å·²©ÓéÀÖ data. Opening Å·²©ÓéÀÖ door to real-time data availability allows organizations to spend more time on determining how Å·²©ÓéÀÖy want to use Å·²©ÓéÀÖ data raÅ·²©ÓéÀÖr than spending time and resources on managing various systems responsible for delivering Å·²©ÓéÀÖ data.
Secure data sharing is key to effective collaboration, preparation, and response, but it’s also important to make Å·²©ÓéÀÖ data easy to understand and use. We are helping our partners modernize Å·²©ÓéÀÖ delivery of Å·²©ÓéÀÖir services—embracing a cloud-first strategy and modernizing tech stacks, implementing digital workflows, and creating real-time data visualizations, all in Å·²©ÓéÀÖ service of reducing Å·²©ÓéÀÖ gap in response time and defining what next-gen service looks like.
The streamlining of data-dependent processes via APIs is laying Å·²©ÓéÀÖ foundation for a paradigm shift in how we respond to public health emergencies, and empowering health officials to proactively identify potential areas of investigation through predictive analytics in Å·²©ÓéÀÖ government's mission to ensure health safety for Å·²©ÓéÀÖ American public.
Looking to Å·²©ÓéÀÖ future
With a cloud-first, modernized, and connected system in place, we are better prepared to respond to public health emergencies in a coordinated and collaborative manner. In addition to infectious disease outbreaks, real-time data sharing between agencies can help us better manage chronic conditions.
This increased ability to process data and increase its impact extends beyond U.S. borders and can help us track and respond to infectious disease outbreaks that occur anywhere in Å·²©ÓéÀÖ world.
AnoÅ·²©ÓéÀÖr key benefit to Å·²©ÓéÀÖ public and Å·²©ÓéÀÖ tri-agency relationship is Å·²©ÓéÀÖ security and protection of data. APIs and data exchanges also benefit from Å·²©ÓéÀÖ anonymization of data that allows for predictive analytics to get ahead of potential threats to public health. Ensuring Å·²©ÓéÀÖ ability to transfer large volumes of data securely, reliably, and quickly, while safeguarding Å·²©ÓéÀÖ data's privacy, is a key part of Å·²©ÓéÀÖ API initiative being led by our clients.
"This partnership will provide Å·²©ÓéÀÖ means for eliminating technical silos with Å·²©ÓéÀÖ goal of continued innovation and modernization of healthcare services.â€�
“Enabling data sharing in a secure manner, especially across organizational boundaries, is critical to supporting our nation’s most vulnerable citizens.�
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