Your thoughts on stimulus-funded EHRs

With the government’s plan to release $1.2 billion in stimulus grants next year for healthcare providers to adopt electronic health records, I believe the technology:

Comments:

– They are absolutely necessary for efforts at quality improvement.

– As an organization on the continuum of care it is our responsibility to keep up with technology and also healthcare standards of practice.

– Will be beneficial if government places no barriers to obtain the money and no government access to medical records.

– Are we certain this is the best way to spend $1.2 billion from the government?

– Has it been quantified regarding cost vs. benefits?

– An internal EFR is not the need. The need is to have the medical information transferred from the doctor and/or the transferring hospital.

– I am a senior citizen who signed up for Medicare Part D plus run in a nursing home. I do NOT feel the program is efficient/effective (cost millions to operate/administer due to many new insurance companies entering the market, there is the Doughnut Hole that, I understand, will be closed costing the government millions (if not billions more), our society already had Medicare and Medicare Replacement Plans (those with Part D already included) so there is definitely NO NEED for an additional program that costs billions more. The program should be included as part of regular Medicare (cutting out all those middle insurance companies in the process) and/or just allow people to enroll in Medicare Replacement Policies. It should be repealed and done as stated. No wonder we are in such a Medicare Crisis and now the government talks about cuts to seniors. None of this makes sense and older people just don’t understand all of this (nor their kids or us providers). There should be an independent (not politicians nor ingrown government workers or AARP people) but possibly some rational groups like the Heritage Foundation (and/or possibly several) to study this and/or other proposals the government politicians/AARP puts forth and gives a “White/Blue” or whatever paper out to the public with sorta “TOWN MEETINGS” to discuss rationally the plans/options and what would be best, least expensive to operate/administer and decreased costs to the consumers and, of course, older people who would be its recipients.

Are you expecting quality service from EHRs? Discuss your thoughts in the comments below.