MELBOURNE, FL – Harris Corporation, an international communications and information technology company, in partnership with the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA), has launched a secure email service that enables health care providers to exchange health information electronically with other providers. 

Delivery of the Direct Secure Messaging (DSM) service marks Harris’ first milestone in the four-year, $19 million contract awarded to develop Florida’s statewide health information exchange (HIE).
 
The Florida HIE DSM service is now online and available to Florida licensed providers.  By using DSM, providers and other health care entities can “push” electronic messages to known and trusted recipients over the Internet.  The service supports several of the information sharing requirements for Meaningful Use, such as the ability to provide a summary of care records for patients referred or transitioned to another provider.
 
“Enabling health care providers in Florida to exchange clinical records over a secure network is one of our primary goals,” said government analyst and AHCA’s HIE Policy Lead Carolyn Turner.  “The new DSM system from Harris supports provider collaboration and aligns with our mission to improve the quality, safety, and delivery of health care in Florida.”
 
As one of the first statewide implementations to go live, the service adheres to NwHIN Direct standards and supports the Office of the National Coordinator’s (ONC) effort to enable the development of technologies to safely exchange clinical information.  As an electronic and web-based system, DSM aims to replace the widespread use of fax machines for referrals and transmission of patient data between organizations.
 
“Transforming healthcare requires a secure and connected framework,” said Jim Traficant, president, Harris Healthcare Solutions.  “Direct Secure Messaging is another standards-based innovation delivered by Harris to enable Florida, other states, and health enterprises to share critical health information in a trusted exchange model.”
 
The secure messaging platform is the first step towards the implementation of a fully connected health information exchange across the State of Florida.  Harris plans to follow the DSM delivery with a Patient Look-up service this fall, which will allow clinicians to search for and retrieve individual patient records from participating sources in the Florida HIE.  At least 20 organizations will be brought into the HIE by 2014.
 
For more information, and to track the progress of the Florida HIE, please visit https://www.florida-hie.net/.

A nationally recognized leader in federal healthcare IT integration, Harris also offers commercial providers a full range of interoperability solutions, including IT infrastructure and management, clinical workflow and analytics, health information exchange, and imaging.  Harris solutions improve health care quality, safety, efficiency, cost and outcomes by ensuring that the right information travels, with security and privacy, to the right person, at the right time, on the right device, at the point of care.
 
About Harris Corporation
Harris is an international communications and information technology company serving government and commercial markets in more than 150 countries. Headquartered in Melbourne, Florida, the company has approximately $6 billion of annual revenue and more than 16,000 employees — including nearly 7,000 engineers and scientists. Harris is dedicated to developing best-in-class assured communications® products, systems, and services. Additional information about Harris Corporation is available at www.harris.com.