I also post threads at EMR update and one of the members, Dr. Al Borges created a post that I also felt was newsworthy for readers here....he makes some very good points about privacy and the omission of the AMA in the latest government rounds in Washington...is the AMA supposed to be the official representation of physicians in the US? We all want and need medical records that inter-operate for better health care, but the questions on how to regulate, create, and implement are still a huge issue of concern...I just attended the annual HIMMS meeting in Orlando and I can't think of any one company that I met with that does not have integration and interoperability either currently in place or in the works...there are system integrators that do just that as well and it seems to be strange that there is a concern that private vendors would even consider the idea of creating software that doesn't have these capabilities...a hot topic and the jury will be out on this one for some time to come...BD
Congress is now meeting behind closed doors trying to craft another bill. Even the AMA has been left out of the negotiations.
There are a lot of lobby groups trying to influence the process. See the article below:
The U.S. Congress needs to pass health-care IT legislation before private companies develop multiple systems that don't talk to each other, two advocacy groups say.
Members of the Health IT Now Coalition and the Information Technology Industry Council (ITI) urged Congress to move ahead with health IT legislation such as the Promoting Health Information Technology Act. The bill would establish a public/private group to recommend health IT standards and certification and would budget US$163 million a year for health-care providers to adopt health IT products, such as electronic health records.
Some groups, including Patient Privacy Rights, have raised concerns that the legislation doesn't adequately address patient privacy issues. "The Senate Wired Act has no privacy protections or language ensuring patient control of health records," the group said on its Web site. "It must not pass unless patients have the right to keep their health records private."
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