Last week, three high-level federal officials tasked with overseeing different areas of the Obama administration's agenda walked into the same conference room, stood at the same podium and touted the same thing -- health IT.
Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra, National Coordinator for Health IT David Blumenthal and Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Director Carolyn Clancy spoke at a joint plenary session of the National Health Information Exchange Summit, the Health IT Summit for Government Leaders and the Eighteenth National HIPAA Summit.
Chopra, Blumenthal and Clancy offered insight into how health IT fits into the Obama's administration's larger health care and innovation goals.
Innovation and Transparency
Chopra called it a "very, very strong sign" that venture capital investments in health IT increased by 37% across 2009, while overall venture capital investments were down 39%.
Chopra predicted that the health IT industry will be an "engine of job creation and investment."
He stressed the need for "product innovation" and said transparency and open government will be essential.
Chopra noted that last month HHS made its Medicare database available for download at no cost as part of the Obama administration's push for a more open and transparent government. The database previously had been available on a CD ROM for $100.
He said the move represents a shift in mindset "to release, not hold valuable data." He added that health care will be on the "front end of this revolution" of open government.
Chopra said, "Tell me what data you want, and it's my job to get it to you." He said that the federal government will continue to protect patient privacy when releasing data.
EHR Use To Become 'Core Competency'
Blumenthal acknowledged that recent studies have shown that only 4% of physicians have a fully functional electronic health record system in place, and that only 1.5% of hospitals are using a comprehensive EHR system. However, he said the "trend is moving upward."
Blumenthal said the health IT provisions of the federal economic stimulus package -- known as the HITECH Act -- addressed many of the barriers to EHR adoption, such as market failure, technology and logistics, and privacy and security concerns. He predicted that the stimulus package will help "catapult" the U.S. beyond other Western countries that have been ahead of the U.S. in terms of health IT adoption.
Blumenthal said, "History has shown that things that improve health care become part of what is used," adding, "I propose to you that in a few years doctors will all support EHRs."
He showed the audience an article from the 1800s in which doctors were debating the usefulness of the stethoscope. He compared physicians' resistance to the stethoscope to the current reluctance to adopt electronic health records. He said, "Using EHRs will become a core competency for physicians. And once we've established that, it will be considered an absolute requisite."
A remaining challenge for ONC is to "get it right" when setting the rules for what health care providers must do to demonstrate "meaningful use" of EHRs.
He said the federal government wants to find the right balance between stretching health care providers and being realistic.
HHS published a proposed rule on the meaningful use of EHRs last month and will accept comments until March 15.
Blumenthal said, "We are expecting lots of comments, and we will take those comments seriously."
Health IT Key To Boosting Health Care Research
Clancy told conference attendees that health IT has been a long-term priority for AHRQ, going back 30 years.
She noted that President Obama's proposed fiscal year 2011 budget includes $32 million in health IT funding for AHRQ, $4 million more than the agency received in FY 2010.
Clancy said that health IT can be "incredibly helpful" in accelerating research. However, she said that health IT, itself, does not improve quality and efficiency, but rather people improve health care.
Clancy told the audience that AHRQ wants to expand the use of longitudinal claims databases, distributed data networks and patient registries for research purposes. She said the challenge to using health IT systems for research is ensuring that the data are used effectively and that being "more informed" means being "better informed."
Clancy said, "Health IT is critical and indispensable, but people have to organize the information. That is really the promise of patient-centered health research."