It’s been three years since Congress approved a nearly $30 billion plan to digitize health care records, yet much of the health care industry is still drowning in paper, a coalition of policymakers from the left and right said Friday.
The Bipartisan Policy Center released a 43-page report detailing the gaps in health IT implementation–the biggest concern being a delay in getting the various systems to be able to talk to one another.
Bill Frist (File photo by Bipartisan Policy Center)
“Health information is fundamental to all the new models of care,” said former Sen. Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), a heart surgeon and co-chair of the Bipartisan Policy Center, a nonprofit research organization in Washington. “Data has got to flow seamlessly throughout this system.” (Frist is a member of the Kaiser Family Foundation’s Board of Trustees. Kaiser Health News is an editorially independent program of the Foundation.)
The government initiative, passed as part of the 2009 financial stimulus package, gives doctors, hospitals and other providers funding incentives to switch to digital record systems. That effort is also considered one of the key elements to overhauling the country’s health care system. Proponents say that electronic records will reduce medical errors and help cut costs by reducing duplicative tests and care. It can also provide enhanced population data to find out the most effective procedures.
Part of that law, known as the HITECH Act, called for health care systems to be able to share patient information. But so far, the new report notes that “the level of electronic health information exchange is very low in the U.S.” The effort has been slowed, the report notes, partially because of federal delays in setting standards for how systems should be able to communicate with one another.
The report identified six barriers to successfully implementing the technology around the country and made recommendations in each of those areas. The barriers include privacy and security concerns, a lack of consumer engagement and the number of changes that providers are juggling as a result of the health care law. The report suggest that doctors, hospitals and other providers might be more inclined to embrace the digital exchange of patient information if they had a business incentive to do so.
The report notes that other causes of delays include a lack of enthusiasm among consumers, who often have misperceptions about how electronic records work and security concerns. Previous research, as the report highlights, shows that “health information exchange has a positive impact on both the cost and quality of care.”
“The patients aren’t the only winners when we deploy effective health IT,” former Michigan Gov. John Engler said. “Digital technology can ensure that providers get promptly paid for their services.”
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Any wonder? They let the morons that ruined the health care industry do the conversion. The very same dopes that kept America’s health care in the dark ages, the hospitals, the doctors, the drug companies and the insurance companies, all put their two cents into the development of Health IT and we are wondering why there are gaps? We should have given Health IT to Master Card or Visa and to get the job done right. I wish they would take all of these MDs and PhDs and so-called “smart people” that make up the health care “inteligencia” and put them in a rocket and send them into space! Morons!
I’ve asked the Obama administration to investigate what happened to me and my electronic medical records, from a hospital that has touted the new Electronic Mecical Records for years to no avail, including Electronic Medical Records from Mayo Clinic, Obama’s prototype. And I wrote to the Kaiser Foundation years ago to investigate what happened to me, again to no avail. These people are from the same bucket. They have no interest in changing the system. This Stimulus money was spent before having any clear idea on how to implement it.
Obama’s prototyle? You asked the Obama Administration to investigate EMR? You wrote to the Kaiser Foundation to investigate? Uh, maybe you are asking the wrong people, huh? Maybe you should ask the right people, huh? Maybe you should have gone here first to get your answers…
http://healthit.hhs.gov
Don’t tell me, let me guess…
You are a Tea Party member, right?
Stimulus money? Huh?
Part of the price of having a democracy is that everybody gets to have their input before a drastic project such as a national Electronic Health Records system can be implemented. With a more authoritarian government like China this would be a 1-yr project. One EHR would be designed and everyone would be forced to use it whether they like it or not. However, since we so mistrust the government and each other here in the U.S., we have to create committees and let the drug companies, insurance companies, hospitals, and doctors all have equal say on what they need from a EHR system. Then, since we believe in a “free market” with the zeal of religious fanatics, we let any random tech start up build and market their EHR systems for sale. Of course, they come in all shapes and sizes and suck at communicating with each other. To top it off, hospitals and doctors are the one stuck with the bill of purchasing the systems. The small primary cares offices now not only have to coordinate your care for all settings but are responsible for controlling the overall cost of your care or they get penalized by insurance companies and Medicare, when so little is within their control since neither insurance companies nor hospitals are willing to share their data with your primary care doctor. Squeezed between rising costs and decreasing payments as it is, of course they rely on the stimulus money to offset the costs of all the technological upgrades.
Also, please know that the EHR/EMR systems are not the same as your own medical records. EMRs are the first step — they are “medical” in that they provide computer-assisted diagnostics and treatment, and are part of the evidence-based medicine initiative. EHRs are what everyone is focusing now, and are much more comprehensive in gathering all the information pertaining to your well-being as well as medical care. Only most recently is there a push to share your EHR with you so that you are better able to take responsibility for your health and manage your medical care.
@MIKE MCDERMOTT, if you have been asking about your own EHR years ago, the technology to share what records your hospital has with you probably wasn’t in place yet. If you are struggling to receive your health records more recently, either they have the wrong email address for you from your consent for to participate, or you overlooked the invitation email they sent you to get registered. Either way, you should contact your primary care office.