Use of electronic health records to support a public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States: a perspective from 15 academic medical centers

Our goal is to summarize the collective experience of 15 organizations in dealing with uncoordinated efforts that result in unnecessary delays in understanding, predicting, preparing for, containing, and mitigating the COVID-19 pandemic in the US. Response efforts involve the collection and analysis of data corresponding to healthcare organizations, public health departments, socioeconomic indicators, as well as additional signals collected directly from individuals and communities. We focused on electronic health record (EHR) data, since EHRs can be leveraged and scaled to improve clinical care, research, and to inform public health decision-making. We outline the current challenges in the data ecosystem and the technology infrastructure that are relevant to COVID-19, as witnessed in our 15 institutions. The infrastructure includes registries and clinical data networks to support population-level analyses. We propose a specific set of strategic next steps to increase interoperability, overall organization, and efficiencies