Epic Systems, a healthcare software company that supports over 300 million patient records, has filed a formal dispute with Carequality, an interoperability network that facilitates the exchange of patient information on a large scale. The dispute involves concerns that Particle Health, a health technology company that acts as a mediator to help health care organizations access necessary data, may not be accurately representing the purpose of its record retrievals.
According to Carequality’s rules, organizations must be approved and adhere to “Permitted Purposes” in order to join the network. Patient data is protected under the federal law HIPAA, which requires patient consent or knowledge for third-party access.
Despite the ongoing dispute between Epic and Particle Health, the majority of Particle Health’s customers are still able to access their medical records from Epic Systems. However, some customers have been affected by the dispute and have experienced delays in accessing their records.
Particle Health CEO Jason Prestinario stated in a release that the company will address the dispute with Epic through official procedural channels. He also mentioned that although Epic had stopped responding to data requests from some customers due to the dispute, many have already returned to normal operations after working with Particle to resolve issues related to specific customers.
