The California Regional Health Information Organization last week announced that it will use the second, $670,000 part of a $1 million two-part grant from the Blue Shield of California Foundation to help health care organizations that work with low-income, underserved populations participate in a statewide high-tech health initiative, the San Francisco Business Times reports.
The grant will help safety-net providers -- which include public and rural hospitals, community clinics and public health departments -- plan and start health care data exchange programs, according to Lisa Payne Simon, the foundation's director for health and technology.
The grant will fund as many as four $50,000 awards to health care communities -- which are geographic groupings or other groups of clinics or hospitals -- that are prepared to exchange electronic data and meet other criteria developed by an advisory group representing safety net organizations, the Business Times reports.
Dr. David Holmquest, president and CEO of CalRHIO, said the grant will boost the use of health IT and other reform efforts. The grant will fund activities that will help all safety-net providers by providing "tools, templates, assessments and (by) building consensus," Holmquest in a statement said (Rauber, San Francisco Business Times, 1/15).