California network demonstrates lab data sharing.

Long Beach Network for Health (LBNH) of Long Beach, Calif., says it can now exchange secure electronic patient clinical information among providers.

A participant in the National Health Information Network, LBNH demonstrated how it could share a patient's laboratory results and other clinical data among community healthcare providers. According to the network, it successfully tested electronic links between Long Beach Memorial Medical Center, Miller Children's Hospital, Talbert Medical Group, Memorial Healthcare IPA, and WellPoint Health Plan using secure Web-based technology. The California network says it anticipates that the interoperable system will be fully operational by the end of the first quarter 2009.

LBNH is a non-profit organization created in 2003 as a health information exchange in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The network is a public-private collaboration of physicians, hospitals, healthcare organizations, and patient advocates.