Microsoft Remedies Health Plans With Free SOA FrameworkMicrosoft Remedies Health Plans With Free SOA Framework

Microsoft said Wednesday it is making available for free via download a new framework and blueprint for health plans to interconnect their myriad of systems and applications.

The new Connected Health Framework Architecture and Design Blueprint for Health Plans is Microsoft's latest push in the health sector, joining other frameworks that Microsoft has introduced for pharmaceutical and life sciences, and also for health care providers.

The new service-oriented architecture can help health plans leverage and interconnect their existing legacy systems without having to develop new interfaces for each connection.

For health plans, "this minimizes development costs," said Dennis Schmuland, Microsoft's U.S. health plans industry solutions director.

By making it easier and less expensive for health plans to interconnect systems, those companies "drive out costs" and can focus on other priorities, like "developing new processes or seizing new business opportunities," said Schmuland. For instance, through the framework, health plans can more easily connect "core systems," such as their customer facing and transactional systems.

"There's a long list of different products that need to knit together" when trying to interconnect these systems, he said.

For instance, the new framework can make it easier for health plans to interconnect systems that allow health members -- or consumers -- to change their primary care physician via a portal or check eligibility of benefits online, he said.