HIPAA Regulatory Alert
Health IT national strategy still missing
The Government Accountability Office says that even though the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is undertaking a number of activities to pursue President Bush's goal for nationwide implementation of health information technology, it still has not developed a national strategy that defines plans, milestones, and performance measures for reaching the goal of interoperable electronic health records by 2014. "Without an integrated national strategy, HHS will be challenged to ensure that the outcomes of its various health IT initiatives support the president's goal for widespread adoption of interoperable electronic health records," GAO said in testimony before Congress.
Among the activities that have been undertaken, according to the GAO testimony:
- the Office of the National Coordinator has taken steps to advance the implementation of both outpatient and inpatient electronic health records;
- HHS' secretary has recognized certain interoperability standards to be implemented in federal healthcare programs;
- the Office of the National Coordinator has begun trial implementation of a nationwide health information network at nine health information exchange organizations across the country;
- the Office of the National Coordinator has released a summary report and toolkit based on the results of its privacy and security solutions contractor's work.
But, GAO says, given the amount of work yet to be done and the complex task of integrating the outcomes of HHS' various initiatives, it is essential that a national strategy for health IT be defined.
The Government Accountability Office says that even though the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is undertaking a number of activities to pursue President Bush's goal for nationwide implementation of health information technology, it still has not developed a national strategy that defines plans, milestones, and performance measures for reaching the goal of interoperable electronic health records by 2014.You have reached your article limit for the month. Subscribe now to access this article plus other member-only content.
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