Karen B. DeSalvo

See the following -

AMA Calls For Reduced Requirements, Penalties For MU Program

Beth Walsh | Innovation + Technology | May 13, 2014

The American Medical Association (AMA) has a long list of ideas to make the Meaningful Use (MU) program better for physicians and shared its recommendations in a letter to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC)...

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Connect for Care

Karen B. DeSalvo, | Health IT Buzz | December 11, 2015

On Tuesday, I spoke at the Bipartisan Policy Center about our vision for the near future where electronic health information is unlocked and securely accessible to achieve better care, smarter spending, and healthier people.It was inspiring to see so many of our partners in the health IT community come together to talk about a future where we have a learning, connected health care system that leverages technology just as well and just as easily as the latest apps we all have on our phones for hailing a ride or paying our bills...

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HHS Launches Cash Contest for Innovative FHIR Apps

Press Release | Department of Health and Human Services | March 1, 2016

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) announced today a three-part strategy to spur the development of market-ready, user-friendly software applications (apps) for consumers and health care providers...The strategy includes two software app challenges with award prizes totaling $175,000 each: one focused on consumer use and one focused on provider use. Additionally, a competitive funding opportunity of up to $275,000 will support the development of an open resource to make it easier for developers to publish their apps and for providers to discover and compare them...

HIMSS14: Open Health Presentations at Annual Health IT Conference

As we outlined in our earlier article, "HIMSS14 Annual Conference and Exhibit Opening with Open Source," open source software as well as collaboration and interoperability in health information technology (HIT) has reached break out levels and the HIMSS conference in Orlando, Florida. Below are some of the conference presentations related to open health. Note the large number of presentations the award-winning VistA EHR developed by the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and its derivative RPMS developed by the Indian Health Service (IHS). Read More »

Tech Rivalries Impede Digital Medical Record Sharing

Robert Pearmay | New York Times | May 26, 2015

Since President Obama took office, the federal government has poured more than $29 billion into health information technology and told doctors and hospitals to use electronic medical records or face financial penalties. But some tech companies, hospitals and laboratories are intentionally blocking the electronic exchange of health information because they fear that they will lose business if they share information on patients with competing providers, administration officials said. In addition, officials said, some sellers of health information technology try to “lock in” customers by making it difficult for them to switch to competing vendors.

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