Moving Forward on Meaningful Use: Heeding the Spirit of the Law

Do you have any explicit advice for the next year or two for CIOs and other IT healthcare IT leaders?

Overall, as they continue to install their EHR systems and move forward on meaningful use, it’s the need to implement those EHRs in a way that’s sustainable over the long haul, and that’s able to accommodate the requirements coming up in stages 2 and 3, and ultimately, to do it in a way that’s consistent with the spirit of the rule.

And it’s important to create synergies with other mandates, such as ICD-10; so if they’re building out smart order sets, for example, getting the data and information necessary not just to meet the meaningful use requirements, but also move forward on the transition to ICD-10. It’s also important to develop the needed data warehouses and clinical analytics—having that ability to look at this holistically, and also provide the training and the change management approaches to be successful over the long term. You also need to support the development of new care models under healthcare transformation—whether healthcare reform stands or falls, because the business community understands that our healthcare system is not sustainable.

We’re seeing the development of emerging new care models. And core to that will be the development of data analytics and technology to help drive the business, including real-time access to information to make real-time change to the quality and cost of care at the same time.