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Health tech bill gets big push in Senate

Posted on: Thursday, 14 July 2005, 16:21 CDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Legislation to encourage development of health information technology got a big boost on Thursday when four powerful senators joined forces to meld rival bills.

Both bipartisan bills dovetail with efforts the Bush administration has begun to promote public-private sector initiatives to develop electronic medical records and computerized prescribing that can make the U.S. health system more efficient while reducing errors.

One goal is to develop "interoperability," meaning that different health information systems would be able to communicate more seamlessly.

Although initial investments in information technology can be steep, these systems are expected to save a lot of money in U.S. health care over the long haul.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican, and New York Democrat Hillary Clinton said they were melding their bill with one proposed by Senate health committee chairman Mike Enzi, a Wyoming Republican, and the panel's top Democrat Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts.

Clinton said the four staffs hoped to draft a combined bill in time for the health panel to approve it next week. Frist hopes the full Senate will "move quickly" on one of his top priorities, a spokesman said.

Also on Thursday, Secretary of Health and Human Services Mike Leavitt announced the creation of the American Health Information Community (AHIC), a public-private sector collaboration that will help set standards and guide the transfer of personal medical records to a high-tech, electronic format.

"Our health care system is saturated with inefficiency," he said in a statement. "Until we adopt modern information technology practices --like electronic health records, e-prescribing, and systematic adverse drug event reporting -- we will not have cost-effective medical care in this country, and we will have far too many medical errors."

Source: REUTERS

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