Posts Tagged ‘HITECH’

Health care providers hemming and hawing over electronic health record (EHR) implementation and the viability of earning financial incentives for “meaningful EHR use” need not worry. The federal government is putting up $1.2 billion to ensure your success. Read more »

Health care providers, health plans, and other entities covered under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) will soon be required to notify individuals in the event their unsecured personal health information (PHI) is breached. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) published an interim final rule with comment period Aug. 24 providing new regulations regarding the HIPAA notice of breach requirements. Read more »

If you’re considering purchasing an electronic medical record (EMR) system, you’re not alone. Plenty of organizations have made the leap before you; so why not learn from their failures and successes? Read more »

Recently, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) released the implementation plan relative to the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH) Act. The plan is titled “The Health Information Technology American Recovery and Reinvestment Act Implementation Plan” (the Implementation Plan).

The HITECH Act, a component of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), authorized $2 billion in spending to expand usage of electronic health records (EHRs) capable of sharing data between systems. The Implementation Plan addresses the need to meet the short implementation deadlines created by the ARRA, as well as the need to achieve long-term improvements in health and health care through adoption of information technology. The ONC will continue to hold hearings to develop additional policies and procedures necessary to achieve the goals of the ARRA.

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David Blumenthal, MD, Health and Human Services (HHS) national coordinator for health information technology (HIT), announced, May 8, the membership of the HIT Policy Committee established under the stimulus bill. The committee held its first meeting May 11 to begin planning a national HIT strategy.

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The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) seeks your input on final guidelines regulating the handling of unsecured protected health information (PHI) breaches by May 21. The rules are mandated by the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act. Read more »