Worried that provisions in the HITECH Act could be “squandered,” healthcare stakeholders sent an appeal to Congress to include healthcare information technology into the administration’s broader healthcare reform efforts.
The eHealth Initiative and 21 other healthcare stakeholder organizations sent a letter to members of Congress requesting that healthcare information technology, particularly provisions of the HITECH ACT be integrated into any health reform legislation that is enacted by Congress in 2009. The letter was signed by Jennifer Covich Bordenick, COO and interim CEO of the eHealth Initiative.
“Congress’ support for reform policies that holistically incorporate health IT and the provisions of the HITECH Act will lay the foundation for a higher quality, safer, more accessible, and more efficient healthcare system,” the letter said. “But if the adoption and meaningful use of health IT is viewed as a separate endeavor from health reform, the likelihood will only increase that the money spent to encourage health IT adoption and information exchange will be squandered due to our failure to leverage the capacity of electronic health information and tools to enable and accelerate health reform that is built on the foundation of health information.”
The letter said, “Any major redesign of our healthcare system must be grounded in a well-defined relationship with the meaningful use of health information technology in order to achieve that advanced level of interconnectivity and interoperability."
The groups suggested a few key areas of integration including:
- Payment reform that incentivizes quality of care over quantity of care, so that providers begin to directly realize financial benefits from utilizing health IT.
- Promoting preventive care that relies upon the abilities of health IT to aid providers in identifying potential conditions in their early stages and support the provider and the patient in pursuing positive health behaviors.
- Utilizing electronic data gathered through health IT to advance the vast amount of work needed to better understand and then address the causes of disparities, both in the cost and in the provision of care.
