The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society is calling on the incoming Obama administration and Congress to invest at least $25 billion in health care information technology.
Those funds, according to the Chicago-based association, would help non-governmental hospitals and physicians adopt electronic medical records. "Additional funding should be allocated to cover EMR adoption by federal and state-owned healthcare providers, and establish I.T. Action Zones," according to the organization. "HIMSS also calls for the State Children's Health Insurance Program to be expanded to make health I.T. available to Medicaid and SCHIP providers of healthcare to children."
The recommendations are part of a HIMSS-developed health I.T. blueprint for federal policymakers. Other recommendations ask the government to:
* apply recognized standards and certified health I.T. products among all federally funded health programs;
* expand Stark Exemptions and Anti-Kickback Safe Harbors for EMRs to cover additional I.T. to provide better data exchange and coordination of care;
* codify the Health Information Technology Standards Board as the national standards harmonization body;
* appoint a senior level health I.T. leader in the administration to oversee a national health I.T. strategy;
* authorize a federal I.T. advisory and coordinating group; and
* conduct a White House summit on health care reform through I.T.
Full text of the blueprint, "A Call for Action: Enabling Healthcare Reform Using Information Technology," is available at himss.org/2009calltoaction.
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