Evaluation Of Health Information Systems

In 2009, the U.S. Government passed The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act, as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, to promote the adoption and meaningful use of health information technology (Mangalmurti, Murtagh and Mello 2060). The HITECH Act authorizes grants and incentives to promote the “meaningful use” of electronic health records (EHR) by providers (2060). The effect is a high commitment to a technology-led system reform, urging a renewed national commitment to building an information infrastructure to support health care delivery, consumer health, quality measurement and improvement, public accountability, clinical and health services research, and clinical

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 identified three main components of meaningful use: the use of a certified EHR in a meaningful manner, electronic exchange of health information to improve quality of care, and the use of technology to submit clinical outcomes and quality measures (Heath Resources and Service Administration, n.d.). ARRA includes many measures to modernize our nation’s infrastructure, with the “Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act” being an example. The HITECH Act is an effort led by Centers for Medicare and Medicare Services (CMS) in support of electronic health records and meaningful use (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, CDC 2016). According to Galbraith (2013), the HITECH Act aims to promote the use of EHRs by providing over $27 billion in monetary incentives for health care providers that become “meaningful users”. CMS uses these core objectives to determine if a health care provider has satisfied meaningful use and is eligible to receive financial incentives (Galbraith, 2013).

The Affordable Care Act of 2010 marks a new era in American health care. Yet in many ways, this era began more than a year earlier, with the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 and its Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) provisions. Although HITECH may be viewed narrowly as legislation to

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act made an investment in the year 2009 to encourage the adoption and implementation of the electronic health records (EHRs)(Cite). EHRs incentive payments were authorized through Medicare and Medicaid to clinicians and hospitals when they privately and securely used EHRs for achieving improvements in care delivery by the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH). The healthcare organizations are expected to demonstrate meaningful use of EHRs. This rule of meaningful use has been implemented to strike a balance between acknowledging the urgency of adopting EHRs for improving the healthcare system and identifying the challenges that would be put forth

Prior to the federal mandate of EHR, research continued to show the fallacies of the healthcare system like the report published from the Institute of medicine, stating that “medical errors are the 8th leading cause of deaths in the U.S. and cost approximately forty billion dollars a year” (Overview, 2012). This was one of many indicators that healthcare needed to be reformed and in 2009, the president signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act or HITECH Act, which mandated that all healthcare providers must comply and begin to transition to electronic medical records (EMR) and demonstrate “meaningful use.” This act set up a timeline, which established that practices and hospitals needed to be up and running with EMR in order to continue receiving reimbursements from federal programs like Medicaid and Medicare.

aperwork; the NYU Langone Medical Center chooses to implement new health informatics technologies to impact its health care delivery and management by purchasing their "Meaningful Use" Certified electronic health records system, “Epic.” Because the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) portion of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) stimulus package allocation of funds for hospitals who meet the requirements of what is known as "Meaningful

In 2009, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) were passed by the Obama legislation to try and improve healthcare for Americans by reducing costs and improving quality. The ARRA is commonly known as the ‘stimulus package’. The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) act was part of the ARRA to help improve our country’s infrastructure. HITECH supports electronic health records– meaningful use (EHR-MU) which is led by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC). HITECH allocated over $27 billion in funds to help encourage the healthcare industry in

Background: The Federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) identified five goals for adopting health information technology (HIT) into the current health care systems that would significantly improve healthcare in America. (Abdelhak, Grostick, & Hanken, 2012, p. 82) These goals will help improve the quality of care within the federal health system by reducing medical errors, cost, and duplication of workload.

“Go Paperless and Get Paid” is how the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) presents the incentives for electronic health records. The United States Department of Health and Human Services (U.S. Department of HHS) distributed more than $160 billion dollars to “improve and preserve health care, health information technology, community health, and prevention initiatives” (United States Department of Health and Human Services [HHS], 2014e). Likewise, the ONC offers “Health IT Adoption Programs” through the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act, seeking to advance the American health care delivery system and to improve patient care through an unique investment towards health information technology (HHS, 2014d). Additionally, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 allows the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to reward eligible hospitals and professionals with monetary incentives as they implement, adopt, or upgrade and demonstrate meaningful use of certified electronic health record (EHR) technology (HHS, 2014b). The Electronic Health Records Improvement Act (H.R. 1331) introduced by the United States House of Representative Diane Black is a bill to further improve the nation’s health care adoption of health information technology.

Anita Ground also stresses on the huge importance of this planning stage by using a concept of system life cycle. It consists of feasibility study, analysis, design, programming, implementation, and lastly maintenance (Ground, 2011, VA TMS training material). The analysis phase in particular would coincide with what the author Yoshihashi is presenting in figuring out office strategy and researching EHR options. Identification of stakeholders and system requirement would play a critical role in EHR adoption (Ground, 2011). Stakeholders would include patients, family, clinicians, billing, registration, and coding as well as the external users such as Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Bottom line is that the new system being purchased would need to provide meaningful use to the clinic based on the current certification standards.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act signed into law in 2009, includes the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act known as the HITECH Act. The act defined specific requirements for receiving financial incentives for ‘meaningful use’ of the electronic health record (EHR). Hospitals and providers could begin implementation of the requirements in 2011 to receive the incentives by meeting specific objectives, after 2015 failure to meet meaningful use requirements will result in penalties. Meaningful use is divided into 3 stages and each stage has objectives and requirements specific to that stage. Hospitals and providers must meet requirements for Stage 1 of meaningful use for two years before

The ARRA includes the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act, which pursues to improve American Healthcare and patient care through an extraordinary investment in Healthcare IT (HIT). The requirements of the HITECH Act are precisely designed to work jointly to provide the necessary assistance and technical operation to providers, enable grammatical relation and organization within and among states, establish connectivity in case of emergencies, and see to it the workforce is properly trained and equipped to be meaningful users of certified Electronic Health Records (EHRs). These computer software products are designed collaboratively to intensify the footing for every American to profit from an electronic health record (EHR) as part of a modernized, interrelated, and vastly improved grouping of care delivery.

Legislation such as the Health Information Technology for Economics and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act promoted meaningful use of electronic health records (EHR) to provide better patient outcomes (CDC, n.d.). Meaningful use is regulated by CMS and National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) and is based on five goals including: improving quality, safety, efficiency and reducing health disparities, engage patients and families in their health, improve care coordination, improve population and public health,

The road to patient-centered care was paved with the passing of the HITECH act, which authorized incentive payments through Medicare and Medicaid to clinicians and hospitals when they use EHRs privately and securely to achieve specified improvements in care delivery. If providers do not become meaningful users of EHRs by 2015, penalties will be triggered through reduced Medicare payments. These provisions aim to create a nationwide electronic health system that is efficient and secure to improve health outcomes and lower the cost of healthcare. To accomplish these goals, the federal government allotted $19.2 billion of funding to promote the adoption and meaningful use of interoperable health information technology and electronic health records (EHRs).

I wholeheartedly agree that understanding evaluation frameworks and the nuances that are sensitive to the healthcare organization whether hospitals or clinics is paramount for health informaticians as they evaluate health information infrastructures. We all know evaluation is a complex process and it is easy to appraise many things but not necessarily the right ones. However, it is quite possible to ponder upon a health information system evaluation framework with more far-reaching and specific measures that would integrate technological, human and organizational issues to facilitate the HIS evaluation (Yusof, Papazafeiropoulou, Paul, & Stergioulas, 2008). Evaluations sanctions us as health informaticians to ascertain whether what