HHS chief unveils plan for health care IT
Electronic health records and nationwide information network will take a decade to develop, Thompson tells health summit.
Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson presented a 10-year plan to develop health care information technology, including electronic health records and a nationwide health information network, during a summit of health information technology professionals in Washington Wednesday.
Thompson said he would appoint a panel of experts to study costs and benefits of the plan and issue a report this fall.
"Health information technology can improve quality of care and reduce medical errors, even as it lowers administrative costs," Thompson said. "It has the potential to produce savings of 10 percent of our total annual spending on health care, even as it improves care for patients and provides new support for health care professionals." The 178-page report, titled "The Decade of Health Information Technology: Delivering Consumer-centric and Information-rich Health Care" was ordered by President Bush this spring and assembled by David Brailer, national coordinator for health information technology, whom the president appointed to the new position in May.
The report outlines four major goals: giving physicians access to electronic health care records at the point of care, connecting patient records and health care information on a national network, allowing consumers to access their own records and other health information online, and improving public health monitoring and research.
Health information technology could eliminate forms that patients fill out at doctors' offices, prevent duplicate tests administered when paper records get lost or cannot be transferred quickly enough from one office to another, and alert doctors when they prescribe drugs that should not be combined with medications a patient already is taking. It also could aid in data collection for public health research and the detection of biological attacks or other epidemics. But information security remains a top concern. The report says HHS will work with the private sector to develop privacy and operating standards.
Under the framework laid out in the report, the government would rely heavily on the private sector, creating incentives for investment in health care IT rather than developing or purchasing the technology itself. The possible incentives it identifies include grants, seed funding, low-rate loans and Medicare demonstration projects to pay doctors for quality of care, not just quantity.
During a June conference in Washington organized by the Center for Health Transformation, a think tank founded by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., Brailer had emphasized that the private sector would take the lead in developing and managing a national health information network. "You do not want the federal government to do this," Brailer had said, arguing that the private sector could manage the initiative more efficiently and reliably.
Thompson also announced plans to develop an Internet portal that would enable Medicare beneficiaries to access their records electronically and to create Medicare regulations for electronic prescriptions.