In a Kaiser Health News opinion piece, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius explains how federal health IT investments from the 2009 economic stimulus package are helping to "reduce many of the obstacles that limited the spread of electronic health records in the past."
Sebelius notes that federal officials have invested in health IT by:
- Creating regional health IT extension centers to help health care providers select EHR systems;
- Offering training programs to strengthen the health IT work force; and
- Providing grants to states for health information exchange.
However, Sebelius writes that "the most promising sign for the future of our health care system is ... what [stakeholders are] already doing." She adds that "two of the nation's largest provider groups, Delaware's Christiana Care Health System and Partners HealthCare in Massachusetts, said that in the future they're going train and support providers who adopt electronic health records and avoid providers who don't make the switch to health IT."
Sebelius writes, "Over the last 30 years, we've watched information technology revolutionize industry after industry, dramatically improving the customer experience and driving down costs." She concludes, "Now that government and stakeholders are coming together, we are finally poised to make the same transformation in health care" (Sebelius, Kaiser Health News, 8/26).