As the healthcare industry continues to navigate new health IT regulations and standards, Karen DeSalvo, MD, HHS' acting assistant secretary for health and national coordinator for health IT, is leading the way.
In these two positions, Dr. DeSalvo has helped draft federal guidances and roadmaps to support the industry in its reshaping of health information systems.
Here are three thoughts from Dr. DeSalvo on the country's present and future IT standing, from an interview with Federal Times.
1. On the new Federal Health IT Strategic Plan: "In the past, what we have done is written the strategic plan through straw men and then gone and talked to the various federal partners to get their feedback. We thought at this point there was so much important conversation that needed to happen that we would pull together a health IT council.
"The prior strategic plan had been more about a set of programs that evolved out of high tech, the meaningful use program and electronic health records. It made a lot of sense at the time that we did it because that is what we were really pushing to do, but it was so refreshing and exciting to know that we had this very quick consensus across the federal partners that this was about people and this was about seeing that the technology would enable not just our work, but our work to advance the health of this country. And we rolled out from there."
2. On interoperability lessons learned from the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense: "The ONC has another table that we sit at, that we coordinate with the VA, DOD and a host of other federal partners, and it's pretty sticky, technical things that we work on with them.
"I was just in Pennsylvania…and the issue again coming up is that they have several health information exchanges — some market-developed and some private-sector developed — and they all have a different privacy policy. The technology is not so much their issue for getting the data moving, it's really getting them all to come to the table around this sort of trust environment. So we have learned a lot from the VA and DOD and, I think, they [have learned] from us as well. It's been a terrific partnership. Again, it's just a reminder that it's complex, not just from a technology standpoint because there are people involved. People have to make some really important decision to protect the data and protect the consumer."
3. On next steps for the health IT strategy: "It boils down to three streams of work: to see that usable data is readily available. That's much of our interoperability work, but I would highlight for you about health information blocking. It's increasingly clear to us that data that can move needs to move now. Sometimes it's being blocked for reasons that are annoying and unreasonable. Sometimes, it's reasonable.
"Secondly, it's about the usability of the products and the marketplace…How can we push out data about transparency and give the buyers some kind of way to look at a scorecard and say, 'This is what I bought and batteries were included?'" So in the space of making the product and system work better, we are going to be focusing a lot on our certification program, but also all of the other tools, both good and bad, that we have to advance the marketplace in the next few months.
"The third area is about reducing the documentation burden and regulations and harmonizing that so we are really clearer about linking the documentation piece to the outcomes."
To read the full interview, click here.
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