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February 11, 2009The Stimulus package has managed to get very near the finish line of it’s Congressional journey without loosing the several billions of dollars promised for HealthIT funding and EMR adoption. From a recent report:
“Health IT is in both the House version of the stimulus bill and a Senate version due for passage today. While the Senate trimmed $3 billion from what committees had suggested, most of the money is still there.
“There is also some magic in the analysis of the Congressional Budget Office, namely an assumption that $15 billion will be saved annually by 2016 solely because of the technology investment.”
Read the full article: “Health IT in both versions of the stimulus.” In fact, for those of you who want a minute to minute HealthIT funding update, Texas Congressman and OBGYN Michael Burgess is providing updates on the bill’s progress via Twitter.
Despite the fact that most in the healthcare industry support government Health IT funding and support of widespread EMR adoption, the idea of this level of government involvement is also - as expected - raising a lot of questions. Some of the more interesting topics right now are this discussion on EMRUpdate.com - “Why Buy EMR Now?” - and this article from the Healthcare Blog, explaining in detail how government funded EMR implementation will actually work:
“It looks as if there will be a new set of certification criteria for “qualified electronic health records” that meet the new features defined in the bill. Given the dollars involved, providers will want to adopt products that meet the bonus criteria. To do so, they must understand what is a “qualified record” and what it means to “effectively use” one.
“The legislation defines a qualified electronic record as one that:
- Includes patient demographic and clinical health information, such as medical history and problem lists
- Has the capacity to provide clinical decision support; allow physician order entry; capture and query information relevant to health care quality; and exchange and integrate electronic health information with other sources.
“The legislation leaves some of the ability to define meaningful use of the certified EHR up to the HHS regulators, but it requires the participating providers to submit clinical quality measures and be “connected for the electronic exchange of health information to improve the quality of health care, such as promoting care coordination.”
“This economic stimulus bill offers real incentives for effective adoption of electronic systems designed to improve care. Physicians have meandered toward EHR adoption. It is inconclusive whether the slow uptake is due to reluctant physicians, lack of a business case for adoption of HIT, or insufficient system capabilities to improve care and save time.”
Read the full article: “Stimulus bill offers docs big incentives for technology, but demands effective use“
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