Readers Write: Optimizing Data Sharing in Rural Healthcare with a Data Lattice

Optimizing Data Sharing in Rural Healthcare with a Data Lattice
By Jeff Brandes

Jeff Brandes is president and CEO of Azara Healthcare.

Focus is intensifying on securing the future of rural health. Across all 50 US states, the infusion of Rural Health Transformation Program (RHTP) dollars is intended to address rural health challenges through the deployment of workforce solutions, new access models, and sustainable technology infrastructure initiatives.

The question is whether the dollars allocated dollars will achieve the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) goals of improving access and patient outcomes in a sustainable way without ongoing state and federal funding.

The stakes are high given the challenges of engaging complex, vulnerable populations in care. Success hinges on building an infrastructure that supports targeted interventions and outreach to prevent decline in patients with chronic conditions.

Shared data is critical. Just as physical infrastructures such as electricity and well-maintained roads are necessary for healthcare access, so is proactive collaboration between key stakeholders. Care teams across community-based hospitals, Federally Qualified Health Centers, behavioral health, public health, and other social service organizations need access to shared, up-to-date patient information to address health issues and close care gaps.

Optimal use of RHTP funds should start with the development of a shared “data lattice” among health centers, hospitals, and health plans to form the basis for healthcare infrastructure. State leaders can then devise a broader strategy that ensures that stakeholders are working from a single source of truth to achieve the goals of value-based care.

Digging Deeper: What is a Shared Data Lattice?

Whether it’s food deserts, lack of jobs, or limited education resources, rural communities often operate from a deficit. The same is true when it comes to patient data that is housed in today’s rural health organizations, many of which are part of the healthcare safety net caring for low-income, uninsured, and vulnerable populations.

Outdated legacy and EHR systems leave data in silos, which often necessitates manual documentation and referral processes that slow care delivery. The result is deferred care, poor and missed revenue opportunities or penalties from inaccurate reporting.

A unified data lattice among health centers, hospitals, and health plans offers a solution. It creates a normalized, shared layer of truth across organizations that have not traditionally functioned as a coordinated network.

In this scenario, primary care can share a patient’s accurate medication history with a behavioral health provider down the road, for example. Or coordinated views between health plans, primary care, and social service agencies can help identify patients who need colorectal cancer screening but do not have transportation, which enables targeted interventions to help them access care.

Building this connected rural healthcare ecosystem requires data integration that supports aggregation of clinical data from disparate EHRs, Medicaid and Medicare Advantage claims, referral and admission and discharge feeds, social drivers of health (SDOH), and care management insights within care team workflows. In addition, systems must support automated regulatory and value-based reporting.

The key to success is alignment between partners who share patients and a commitment to innovation. In rural communities, where roughly 20% of Americans live, investments in shared data infrastructure will reduce the burden on clinicians at a time when workforce is at a premium. Meaningful investments in generative AI, not the next shiny object, can accelerate data transformation and reporting tasks.

Shared Data Lattice: Making the Business Case

State leaders will soon need to demonstrate ROI and sustainability for their RHTP investment dollars. That accountability requires more than good intentions. It must make the business case for the right technology infrastructure to power better care delivery and better reporting.

Without a unified data infrastructure, calculating ROI is often slow and often requires manual processes to pull together needed sources and to ensure that reporting is reliable. In contrast, a shared data lattice establishes a framework for clarity.

For example, when stakeholders can tie avoided emergency department visits to dollars invested in preventive care in near real-time, that’s hard ROI. Or, when risk stratification processes lead to better identification of diabetes patients at risk of decline, state leaders can link interventions to improved A1C scores.

For public health and advocacy organizations, the value of a shared data lattice extends beyond operations. It replaces siloed reporting with real-time intelligence that supports both prevention and coordinated care. States can monitor progress continuously and adjust strategy proactively instead of reacting to crises. With advanced infrastructure, legislators can track progress through rural impact scorecards that aggregate metrics across health centers, hospitals, and health plans.

For rural health centers and hospitals, the benefits are immediate, as they eliminate data blind spots. Organizations can demonstrate value using hard evidence, and alignment with state rural transformation becomes more likely.

Data: An Essential Community Health Infrastructure

A rural health data lattice ensures that independent providers have the same visibility, coordination, and analytics capabilities that large health systems routinely rely upon. It ensures that the most vulnerable patient populations have the same quality access to care as others.

Measurable rural transformation does not have to be distant. With the right infrastructure and partnerships, it can begin now.