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The Economic Stimulus Package - How Do We Accelerate Health IT Adoption?

Thanks to the recently passed "Health Care and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act" (full text on Wikipedia) nearly $19 billion has been allocated to drive HIT integration into the US medical system.  However, only a small percentage of the investment actually goes to fund implementation.  So what do we, as healthcare providers already struggling in this economy, do to navigate the muddy waters around the implementation of Electronic Health Records (EHR)?

We already know the Obama Administration believes Social Media offers a low cost way to improve transparency and drive community engagement, so here are my top 6 ideas where Social Media could be used to ease and improve the HIT integration process.

1.  Offer providers trusted product reviews - Launch a "crowdsourced" solution where healthcare providers, practice managers, and hospitals can collectively evaluate the hundreds of EHR products - make it transparent, explain certification standards, invite industry, and let the conversation flow.  Imagine a site like CNet reviews but just focused on EHR.  Perhaps a solution similar to ProCompare, but make it easy for users to determine a reviewer's relative expertise.

2.  Simplify the selection/purchase process for small practices - Provide a one stop shop where small practices and provider groups can compare prices, download trial software and purchase off the shelf products.  (#1 and #2 may well be different parts of the same offering)

3.  Provide regular updates on policy changes via Twitter or Facebook - Follow the example CDC and FDA have set and keep the masses engaged and informed through the medium of their choice (web, rss, email, sms).

4.  Share best practices on EHR implementation and use - Let providers and administrators benefit from the collective experience of their peers.  Best practices are already being shared on a limited basis on sites such as EMR Update and Ozmosis, but scale it, and get everyone involved.

5.  Open up CCHIT and the march towards interoperability - a large portion of the medical record is not useful in clinical encounters - let clinicians participate more easily in determining the requirements and certifications that will be set over the coming year.   www.change.gov was a great example of how transparency and community engagement can be embedded - the current CCHIT system only allows limited public involvement, and there is no way to see other peoples ideas during the comment process.

6.  Discuss product improvement/enhancements  - Enable EHR users to suggest and vote for their top product enhancement requests and then let all vendors benefit from the collective feedback to improve their respective products and foster greater interoperability.  Companies like Dell's Ideastorm and Starbucks' My StarbucksIdea have benefited from engaging their users directly to capture innovative ideas.

          

The health care industry is comprised of slow adopters, with good reason - we care for the lives and health of people.  Thus, we want the technology we depend on to be tried and tested before using it on a large scale.  Social Media provides an easy and cost effective way to evaluate, collaborate, and vet products and ideas before we rush in.  Adding these types of tools into our typical decision making process will improve outcomes and simplify the process for many who would otherwise be hopelessly lost.

Jason Bhan, MD
Co-Founder, Ozmosis

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