Health IT

Health IT initiatives harness current and emerging information technologies to improve patient safety and convenience while reducing the cost of providing care. Some of the numerous benefits of health IT initiatives will include: a reduction in medical errors, avoidance of costly duplicate testing, and elimination of unnecessary hospitalizations.

The benefits of health IT initiatives range from consumer convenience, as patients will not have to fill out repetitive paper work, to life-saving early detection of an infectious disease outbreak, as anonymous data from emergency rooms is sent to public health systems instantly. These initiatives aid in fulfilling the President”s goal for most Americans to have electronic health records by the year 2014.

American Health Information Community (AHIC) Topics
The American Health Information Community (AHIC) is a federal advisory body, chartered to make recommendations to the Secretary of HHS on how to accelerate the development and adoption of Health IT. The Community will make recommendations to the Secretary of HHS to enable advancement in four areas of focus by the end of 2006.

• Consumer Empowerment - Make available a consumer-directed and secure electronic record of health care registration information and a medication history for patients.
• Chronic Care - Allow the widespread use of secure messaging, as appropriate, as a means of communication between doctors and patients about care delivery.
• Biosurveillance - Enable the transfer of standardized and anonymized health data from the point of health care delivery to authorized public health agencies within 24 hours of its collection.
• Electronic Health Records - Create an electronic health record that includes laboratory results and interpretations, that is standardized, widely available and secure.

Highlighted Federal Efforts

Health & Human Services

Health & Human Services (HHS) - HHS is facilitating the development of standards for Health IT systems that will improve patient care and increase efficiency across the health care system. HHS, through several of its agencies, also provides funding to organizations engaged in building and testing Health IT systems, standards and projects.

Department of Defense

Department of Defense (DoD) - Currently, thousands of military medical providers use the DoD”s electronic health record system, AHLTA, and nearly 300,000 outpatient visits are captured digitally every week. DoD”s vision is to provide each patient with a continuously updated digital medical record from the point of injury or care on the battlefield to discharge from military clinics and hospitals in the United States. These records would be completely transferable electronically to the Veterans Health Administration as part of the Joint Patient Electronic Health Record (JPEHR).

Department of Veterans Affairs

Veterans Health Administration (VHA) - The VHA is a division of the U.S. Department of Veteran”s Affairs, and provides care for over five million veterans of the United States Armed Services. The VHA”s electronic health record system, My HealtheVet, allows patients to refill prescriptions online, and provides access to health information, links to Federal and VA benefits and resources, and the patient”s Personal Health Journal. The VHA continues to add capabilities to My HealtheVet, to empower consumers to take a more active role in managing their health and health care.