Combatting the opioid crisis is a top priority for the Trump Administration and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).  We are making progress. Just last week we released the 2017 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) data, which showed significantly more people received treatment for substance use disorder in 2017 than in 2016; this was especially true for those with heroin-related opioid use disorders.  In addition, the number of people who initiated use of heroin in 2017 was less than half of the number in 2016.

September is National Preparedness Month, which makes it the perfect time for clinicians and healthcare entities to consider what would happen if their health information technology (health IT) systems are unavailable or in some way compromised. This issue has become more important over time as healthcare is increasingly dependent on technology and a growing percentage of the workforce have never practiced without health IT and may not know what to do if their systems or information are unavailable.

In 2017 we announced “A 5-Year Goal to Transition the ONC Health IT Certification Program’s Testing Portfolio” to include as many industry-developed and maintained testing tools as possible. This month, we reached another important milestone toward this goal: the National Council for Prescription Drug Programs (NCPDP) has formally taken over the stewardship of the electronic prescribing testing tool approved for use under the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) Health IT Certification Program (Certification Program).