The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT will award its first round of grants to establish regional health IT extension centers this month, according to a notice in the Federal Register, Health Data Management reports.
The 2009 federal economic stimulus package provided about $598 million for the regional extension center program.
ONC said the grants would help establish 60 extension centers. The program calls for the centers to provide technical assistance and other resources to help health care providers adopt electronic health record systems (Goedert [1], Health Data Management, 2/2).
Surveying Patients on EHRs
ONC also published a notice announcing plans to survey about 1,700 patients on their experiences with physician practices that use EHR systems. ONC said it would enlist 84 primary care practices to help with the study.
The survey aims to help ONC learn more about how EHRs could affect patient satisfaction with their medical care (Goedert [2], Health Data Management, 2/2).