On November 1st, the New York State Health Foundation (NYSHealth) released a Request for Proposals (RFP) for hospitals seeking to implement OpenNotes, which is a national effort to give patients access to the visit notes written by their doctors, nurses, or other clinicians. Since 2017, NYSHealth has supported 10 hospital systems and 6 federally qualified health centers and other non-hospital settings statewide to implement OpenNotes.
Through this RFP, NYSHealth will provide hospitals with funding, tools, and technical assistance to effectively implement and share visit notes. The 21st Century Cures Act Information Blocking Rule requires health care providers to share clinical notes with patients free of charge. Accordingly, NYSHealth expects that applicants are already making some level of financial investment to implement OpenNotes within their facilities and that funding available through this RFP will accelerate and expand the use of OpenNotes.
NYSHealth will award grants of $30,000 to 25-30 hospitals to supplement the costs associated with implementing OpenNotes. Any hospital facility in New York State that is implementing and sharing OpenNotes in compliance with federal regulations is eligible for funding through this RFP. Both hospital facilities that are in the initial phases of implementing OpenNotes and those that are seeking to optimize their early implementation to make sure it works well for clinicians and patients are eligible and encouraged to apply.
The full RFP is available here, and our summary can be found here. Applications are due on December 6th. On November 16th from 10am-12pm, NYSHealth will host a webinar with presentations, discussions, and an audience Q&A regarding the implementation of OpenNotes. Details and registration are available here.