The plan outlines five goals:
- Achieve adoption and information exchange through meaningful use of healthcare IT;
- Improve care, improve population health, and reduce healthcare costs through use of healthcare IT;
- Inspire confidence and trust in healthcare IT;
- Empower individuals with healthcare IT to improve their health and the healthcare system; and
- Achieve rapid learning and technological advancement.
After hearing from our member companies, last week CompTIA submitted its comments on the plan, which will now be reviewed by the Office of the National Coordinator as it continues to update and implement the plan going forward. You can review the full text of our comments, or see below for a summary:
CompTIA Views on the Federal Health IT Strategic Plan
Overall, CompTIA applauds both the general goals of the plan and that the federal government has taken extremely productive steps toward achieving those goals. Nevertheless, in order to realize our shared commitment to better health outcomes, a more efficient delivery of medical services, and a satisfied patient base, CompTIA believes that IT service providers must be made more of a partner in achieving these goals.
Education
CompTIA supports the federal government’s focus given to universities and colleges to graduate more individuals trained in health IT. Yet, from our experience, very little thought has been given to training existing IT professionals who already have basic IT skills but who need additional help in adding a health IT “bolt-on” to their considerable IT knowledge and experience. These professionals could be activated very rapidly to help with the transition, but they need some economic assistance – such as an HIT education tax credit – to offset some of the costs of this sizeable investment.
Making Technical Assistance More Effective
CompTIA sees wisdom in the federal government’s efforts to provide outreach and technical assistance to medical providers by establishing Regional Extension Centers (RECs). However, we suggest that some refinements could make RECs much more effective, as initial nationwide review by CompTIA uncovered a considerable amount of variance among different REC sites. While CompTIA is investigating further, we suggest that RECs integrate its outreach activities with small IT companies that already are serving the IT needs of medical providers in underserved communities. We also suggest that the RECs could play a much more robust role in linking medical professionals to IT service providers, and vice-versa.
Inspiring Trust & Confidence in Healthcare IT
CompTIA applauds the efforts made under the HITECH Act to raise privacy standards for personal health information (PHI). That said, we are concerned that some of the requirements could present a substantial burden on the small IT service provider that could chill entry into the HIT space. This includes provisions that could leave small IT companies exposed to new standards of liability, possibly resulting in criminal penalties and civil fines that can range up to $1.5 million. Additionally, new trigger notification requirements for security breaches leave open questions as to how state and federal standards will interact with each other, possibly leading to confusion to small businesses in the IT space.
