Building on successful trial implementations last December, the Nationwide Health Information Network is prepared to do "heavy lifting" in 2009 to roll out limited production pilots, NHIN team members said at a Sunday morning panel presentation.

"We are standing on the brink," said Ginger Price, program director for the NHIN, at the session, "Lighting Up the NHIN: What It Means to You." "We have the building blocks to put this together."

"This year we're standing up," she said, adding that the NHIN will be launched in a robust way in 2010.

The NHIN has already achieved its first 2009 milestone in the live exchange of data between the Social Security Administration and MedVirginia, a regional health information organization in Virginia. The collaboration has only one month of data, but early results are good, said Buff Colchagoff, a NHIN team member.

One provider network is participating and four more are considering coming online this year. The participating provider had 3,200 eligibility requests in 2008, and 80 percent of the predicted load is being processed electronically.

Colchagoff said the impact lies in the reduction of disability processing claims from 72 to 75 days to within days and minutes.

"True and broad interoperability is tough to achieve and requires an iterative process," he said. "We need to do this in a more incremental and controlled way."

Mariann Yeager, policy and governance lead for the NHIN, said the NHIN Cooperative Group, comprising more than 20 federal agencies, statewide and regional organizations and provider groups, is working to address the variability in stakeholder needs. They are also working on the trust agreement, the Data Use and Reciprocal Support Agreement. "Establishing trust is critical," she said.

When asked about the business case for non-government agencies to participate in the NHIN, Price said the NHIN team would develop one this year.