"health IT" Posts

Portrait of Mat Kendall

ONC’s RECs Prepare to Provide Meaningful Use Help

Mat Kendall | August 11, 2010

To support the adoption and meaningful use of electronic health records, ONC has funded 60 Regional Extension Centers (RECs) across the country. The goal of the RECs is to provide outreach, education, and on-site technical assistance to support 100,000 primary care physicians implementing electronic health records (EHRs) into their practices and working to attain meaningful use of their systems.

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Portrait of Joshua Seidman

Guiding Principles for Stage 1 Meaningful Use Adjustments

Joshua Seidman | July 30, 2010

The release of the CMS Medicare & Medicaid EHR Incentive Program Final Rule [link] on July 14 marked the end of the Stage 1 process for defining “meaningful use.” The final steps of that process involved reviewing, synthesizing, analyzing and reacting to more than 2,200 comments received from the public. The comments addressed big-picture principles and arcane details, and just about everything in between. We were very grateful for the public input and are very excited to announce the Stage 1 Meaningful Use requirements.

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Portrait of Dr. David Blumenthal

The Future of Health Care and Electronic Records

Dr. David Blumenthal | July 13, 2010

Today, we’ve taken great steps forward in bringing America’s health records into the 21st century. Widespread and meaningful use of fully functional electronic health record systems combined with a robust infrastructure for broad-based health information exchange can improve the quality, safety, and efficiency of health care for all Americans.

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Portrait of Dr. David Blumenthal

Health IT Adoption

Dr. David Blumenthal | June 14, 2010

Introducing change in health care is never easy. Historically, adopting our most fundamental medical technologies, from the stethoscope to the x-ray, were met with significant doubt and opposition. So it comes as no surprise that in the face of change as transformational as the adoption of health IT – even though it carries the promise of vastly improving the nation’s health care – some hospitals and providers push back. I resisted using EHRs while an internist in Boston,

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Portrait of Dr. David Blumenthal

Health IT Journeys: Share your EHR Implementation Stories

Dr. David Blumenthal | May 27, 2010

Across the country, in practices large and small, urban and rural, general and specialized, health care providers are beginning their journey towards the meaningful use of electronic health records (EHRs). Some practices are in the preliminary stages of learning about health IT, while others have already implemented systems and are using them to the benefit of patients.

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