InteropNow! @ ViVE: Building Confidence in Health Data Interoperability with PIQI

In this episode, host Sandy Vance sits down with Charlie Harp, the CEO of Clinical Architecture to talk about the importance of data quality. They discuss the Patient Information Quality Improvement (PIQI) Alliance, an open-source framework for measuring healthcare data quality. The framework is designed to provide a standardized way to assess the usability and trustworthiness of clinical data across different formats like FHIR, CCDA, and HL7. Charlie emphasizes the importance of data quality for healthcare analytics, decision support, and AI, and explains how PIQI scores data quality with detailed metrics.

In this episode, they talk about:

• PIQI Alliance provides a standardized framework to measure healthcare data quality. 

• The framework is vendor-agnostic and works across multiple data formats (FHIR, CCDA, HL7).

• PIQI scores data at holistic and data-class levels (labs, medications, and immunizations).

• PIQI is open source to make it available for everyone.

• Clinical Architecture offers a commercial implementation called PIQXL Gateway for practical use.

• The framework is being balloted through HL7 for validation, but is not rooted solely in HL7 standards.

• Data quality is critical for effective AI use in healthcare.

• The alliance encourages industry participation to improve the framework.

• PIQI can help organizations meet regulatory requirements and improve data governance.

• The PIQI website offers resources, documentation, and ways to get involved.

A Little About Charlie:

Charlie Harp is the founder and CEO of Clinical Architecture, a pioneer in healthcare data innovation. With over 35 years in the industry, he led the creation of the first deterministic engine for semantic interoperability. Today, he drives Clinical Architecture’s mission to transform healthcare through cutting-edge software and expert-led services. A frequent speaker and thought leader, Charlie also hosts the Informonster podcast, where he dives into data quality, interoperability, and the future of health IT.