HHS Announces Plans to Accelerate Health Information Exchange

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently issued a request for information (RFI), which includes several potential new policies and ideas to advance health information exchange (HIE) across providers. HHS’ 2013 goals to expand HIE include the following:

• Have 50 percent of physician offices use electronic health records (EHRs) and 80 percent of eligible hospitals receive meaningful use incentive payments by the end of 2013;
• Enhance the focus on electronic exchange across providers through a variety of policies;
• Increase the use of EHR through initiatives, such as the Blue Button, which allows Medicare beneficiaries to access Medicare records online;
• Implement meaningful use stage 2, which will determine the data that must be exchanged between health information technology (HIT) systems; and
• Ensure that the integrity of HIT is sound (e.g., through carrying out extensive medical reviews, and publishing Comparative Billing reports).

HHS is seeking public input on the RFI until April 21.

The HHS news release on 2013 HIT agenda is available here.

Department of Health and Human Services. “HHS Announces 2013 Agenda To Bring Down Costs and Improve Quality of Care Through Implementation of Health Information Technology.” News Release. 6 Mar. 2013.