HIMSS: Moving From Stimulus Hope To Real Health-Care IT Projects

If there was a dominant theme at this year's Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference in Chicago, it was undoubtedly the federal stimulus--what the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act means for those with a health-care IT stake, and what they can do to capitalize on the opportunities it presents.

In keynotes and high-level presentations from the likes of actor Dennis Quaid, former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan and Kaiser Foundation Health Plan Chairman and CEO George Halvorson, HIMSS attendees heard the arguments that have since the Obama campaign and far earlier been so often repeated as to appear rote. In essence, American health care needs fixing on a number of levels and technology and should include the widespread adoption of electronic medical records (EMRs) as part of a national health information system.

The stimulus appropriations specific to EMRs--some $19 billion in incentive payments for physicians and hospitals that can demonstrate "meaningful use" of an EMR--are a catalyst for those efforts.

The stimulus "lowers the financial hurdle, undoubtedly," said Dr. George Taylor Jr., vice president of Health IT Programs at Northrop Grumman. "So the next piece is, how do you solve the problem of every doctor--trained in different places, with different styles and different preferences--with an EMR that's designed for one? How do you get past that? The important money is years out, so now is the time to get out there."

While that nebulous "meaningful use" concept still hasn't been defined by the Department of Health and Human Services, the tone at HIMSS was "don't wait around."

Some sources expressed concern that back-end infrastructure, from storage capabilities to broadband, wasn't being accounted for--that is, that the stimulus money would benefit EMR adoption but not what was necessary to support it in the long term. Others had faith that the stimulus will do what it's supposed to: save health-care organizations enough money to spend on better, more efficient systems overall.

"There's enough money in that if they do it right, the cost savings in there will be enough to do those things," said Richard Howe, vice president of business development at Healthcare Informatics Associates, Bainbridge Island, Wash. "The stimulus package is adamant about standards--without that, you have nothing."

Various conversations between Channelweb and VARs, vendors, health-care CIOs and other industry experts throughout the conference painted the same picture: It is time to get past the initial excitement over the stimulus and anticipate what needs to be done next, whether "meaningful use" is defined or not.

"Everyone is on the stimulus bandwagon," said Jason Fradin, vice president of marketing and communications at InfoLogix, a Hatboro, Pa.-based solution provider. "But it's really nothing new to us."

Fradin's suggestion--that mainstream interest in EMRs and health-care IT was shining a light on something most folks inside of health IT have been doing for ages--wasn't exactly unique.

Nor was the thought that there are enough clues about "meaningful use" in the basic needs of a back-end infrastructure to support EMRs--namely, that an EMR needs to be easy to use and able to store, secure, regulate, share and sort data.

"A lot of the folks here have great [EMR] systems," said Scott Storrer, president and CEO of MEDivision, which makes payer software and management solutions designed to support EMRs. "But they can't do anything with the data. We're waiting for the stimulus to get a little bit more definition like everybody, but not a lot of people seem to be asking what the ecosystem is going to look like after that happens."

NEXT: The Struggle To Support EMRs