“When the Veterans Affairs and Defense departments meet on May 14 to discuss interoperable electronic health records, it will be 37 years since the idea was first proposed to share medical information for returning service members and veterans…”
“Despite being well aware of the time it had already taken — 27 years and billions of dollars for failed efforts to get the VA and DOD to create compatible EHRs — Congress in 2009 decided to take unprecedented action to push the private sector into adopting a nationwide system in a ridiculously short period of time. One of the provisions of the $836 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 was the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act…”
“To date, the stimulus provisions mandating EHR have cost taxpayers $36 billion…”
“In short, the government EHR “open season” created winners and losers, wasted taxpayer dollars and broke more promises. It did not make medicine safer, health care better or save money…” Read the full article here.
Source: It Is Time to Fix the Electronic Health Records Boondoggle – By Tom Schatz, May 7, 2019. Morning Consult.
