The call came out again from President Bush for physicians and hospitals to boost efficiency by jumping on the electronic medical record bandwagon. At The Cleveland Clinic under a banner reading "Better Healthcare, Better Technology," Bush called for a doubling of federal funds in FY05 to $100 million to promote healthcare IT—which government analysts estimate could cut 20 percent from the $1.6 trillion U.S. annual health bill.
The long-term vision is a totally interconnected electronic information infrastructure in which all information about a patient from any source could be securely available to any healthcare provider when needed, while assuring patient control over privacy. Of course it's the getting there that's the challenge - and it's the necessary planning and infrastructure that Uncle Sam will pay for. For fiscal 2006, the White House is asking Congress for $125 million.
To put healthcare's IT investment in perspective, most industries spend $8,000 per worker on IT. Healthcare spends about $1,000 per worker, the president said last spring.
As you know, Bush launched his healthcare IT initiative last year in his state of the union address that proposed $50 million within HHS for the Office of the National Coordinator for Healthcare Information Technology, which David Brailer, MD, was later named to head. (Congress failed to fund the requested $50 million, but Bush and Dr. Brailer are now urging Congress to reprogram money to fund it.) Dr. Brailer is a keynote speaker at this month's HIMSS meeting in Dallas.
Logistics aside, once appropriated, the money is slated to pay for healthcare IT demonstration-based studies to assess costs and benefits of public and private sector investments and practices, to help develop technology standards, research human-machine interfaces and enable the incorporation of SNOMED-CT into EHR systems, among other initiatives. In 2007, the government is expected to start providing grants, loans and pay-for-performance initiatives (which CMS is starting to pilot at 10 sites) to spur healthcare IT adoption. The Cleveland Clinic is one of the facilities helping to develop standards, and a $3 million grant recipient.
Legal barriers to sharing EHR systems by physicians and hospitals, such as the Stark Law (physician self-referral), also would be addressed.
The government's role in healthcare IT is a facilitator to create favorable market conditions, including amassing government resources, to make it easier for healthcare providers to begin using technology. As Bush posed at Cleveland Clinic: "The fundamental question facing the country is can we have a healthcare system that is available and affordable without the government running it? Absolutely.
For more details, visit www.itrd.gov/pitac/meetings/2004/20040617/20040615_hit.pdf
Mary joined TriMed Media in 2003. She was the founding editor and editorial director of Health Imaging, Cardiovascular Business, Molecular Imaging Insight and CMIO, now known as Clinical Innovation + Technology. Prior to TriMed, Mary was the editorial director of HealthTech Publishing Company, where she had worked since 1991. While there, she oversaw four magazines and related online media, and piloted the launch of two magazines and websites. Mary holds a master’s in journalism from Syracuse University. She lives in East Greenwich, R.I., and when not working, she is usually running around after her family, taking photos or cooking.