H3IT: Home Healthcare, Hospice, and Information Technology Conference

Under the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH) Act, home health agencies (HHAs) and hospices did not receive the health information technology (IT) incentives provided to other healthcare organizations. Leveraging IT with constrained resources presents higher challenges and risks of success among these providers. Therefore, HHAs and hospices must effectively and efficiently leverage IT to meet their pressing priorities. Health IT use among caregivers and patients has also been limited due to cognitive and health limitations, privacy concerns, and perceived complexity and lack of usefulness. Research into developing, testing, and implementing IT-based health innovations is urgently needed to support leveraging IT effectively and efficiently in home healthcare and hospice settings, which share unique characteristics and challenges due to their off-site, intermittent, and interdisciplinary nature. The priority areas include care coordination, decision support, and patient-centeredness. Artificial intelligence (AI), interoperability, telehealth, and security technologies deserve special attention in addressing the priority areas. Leveraging quality big data through the appropriate use of data analytics and AI constitutes an important area of study, and various moral, ethical, and legal issues in this context should be studied. Research is also needed to strengthen the use of health IT among patients and caregivers. There is currently a shortage of research contributing to an evidence base to support better leveraging health IT in home healthcare and hospice. There is insufficient communication among home healthcare and hospice stakeholders, e.g., providers, IT vendors, and government agencies, to align their goals for research collaboration. To bridge these gaps, the principal investigator (PI) and other Senior/Key personnel will organize an innovative interdisciplinary research conference, H3IT: Home Healthcare, Hospice, and Information Technology Conference, with two specific aims: (i) Strengthen the evidence base for leveraging health IT in home healthcare and hospice through facilitating interdisciplinary research, and (ii) Provide a forum to disseminate research results to multiple stakeholders and foster an interprofessional dialogue among them to strengthen IT adoption in home healthcare and hospice. We will partner with the National Alliance for Care at Home (NACH) and co-locate H3IT with NACH’s Annual Meeting to bring all stakeholders together in one meeting. Aligning with the National Institute on Aging’s research goals, H3IT addresses crucial public health problems, including but not limited to the burden of Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) and AD-Related Dementia (AD/ADRD) because patients living with AD/ADRD constitute about a third of patients served at home.