Healthcare reform legislation awash in IT
It’s fascinating — and a little scary — to see things come to pass that were predicted so many moons ago.
This post by John Moore, from yesterday’s Government Health IT, describes how the legislative reform package just signed by President Obama sets the stage for many long predicted, eagerly awaited IT developments:
- web portals to shop for insurance plans
- web-based assistance to determine eligibility for insurance exchanges
- ratings of health plans, based on quality and patient satisfaction
- quality measure reporting
- IT-enabled networks to coordinate care of chronically ill patients
- IT-enabled Consumer Operated and Oriented Plans (CO-OPs)
Not all of these involve EMRs — none, in fact. But more than one will depend upon EHRs, the more widely integrated version of the original electronic medical record.
Electronic Health Records — digital records that are interconnected with other systems of healthcare delivery besides the word processor that many clinicians still consider the heart of a patient record — will allow access to the basic data needed for many of the proposed changes. Hard to publish how well a plan does caring for its diabetics, for example, if nobody’s keeping track of…how well it’s taking care of its diabetics.
EHRs can do that, down to the last A1c and LDL cholesterol score.
What’s remarkable isn’t the specific groundwork being laid, it’s the underlying, iterative process.
- Gather hard numbers.
- Compare and publish those numbers.
- Utilize IT technology to facilitate both tasks.
- Observe how IT allows advances that would have been impossible to even conceive before.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: the days of wine and roses are over.
Data mining and statistical comparisons as things “those pencil-pushing insurance guys” used to deal with? Now, these activities will determine which health plan your mom picks.
Publishing of patient satisfaction numbers (on plans as well as doctors) as something to be whispered about (will it ever happen)? It’s already here.
“Those guys” aren’t just the insurance suits, and they don’t push pencils anymore. They push IT, and they should include you, if you are directly involved in the delivery of healthcare in America.
Wakey, wakey. The noises you’re hearing aren’t the movers coming.
They’re already here.
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