Washington
In late July, Department of Health and Human Services Secretary
Tommy Thompson released the outline of a 10-year plan to implement
the adoption of electronic health records (EHRs) and to build a
network to link health records nationwide. HHS said the new plan
would “transform the delivery of health care by building a
new health information infrastructure.”
“America needs to move much faster to adopt information
technology in our health care system,” Thompson said.
“Electronic health information will provide a quantum leap in
patient power, doctor power and effective health care. We can't
wait any longer.” Besides improving the quality of care and
reducing medical errors, he continued, information technology (IT)
“has the potential to produce savings of 10 percent of our
total spending on health care.”
Prepared by Dr. David J. Brailer, the new national coordinator
for health IT, the initiative lays out the broad steps needed to
achieve “always-current, always-available electronic health
records for Americans.”
The plan identifies four major goals: (1) informing clinical
practice by bringing IT tools to the point of care, especially by
investing in EHR systems in physician offices and hospitals; (2)
interconnecting clinicians by building an interoperable health
information infrastructure so that records follow the patient and
clinicians have access to critical health care information; (3)
personalizing care by using health IT to improve consumers' access
to and involvement in their own care; and (4) improving population
health by expanding the nation's capacity for public heath
monitoring, quality of care measurement and bringing research
advances more quickly into medical practice.
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