Obama Delivers Major Innovation Strategy with Health IT/Tech as Key Focus
President Obama delivered a major policy speech on September 21, 2009 in upstate New York on the role of innovation in developing growth and quality jobs. In discussing healthcare, Obama said “the recovery plan that we passed earlier this year has begun to modernize our health system.  So innovation can also help drive down the cost for everybody.  We are taking long-overdue steps to computerize America’s health records. See More

While some countries have made dramatic progress in advanced health IT systems, the United States has struggled to make progress and is far behind international best practices, according to a study released today by the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF).The study: Explaining International IT Application Leadership: Health IT, identifies elements contributing to success with health IT, including strong national-level leadership, the use of incentives and mandates, and the deployment of shared IT infrastructure in the health-care sector, and recommends strategies for policymakers to jumpstart progress on health IT adoption. “Countries like Denmark, Finland and Sweden demonstrate that widespread use of mature technologies like electronic health records improve the efficiency and effectiveness of health care,” said Daniel Castro, ITIF senior analyst. “Policymakers in the United States should heed the lessons learned by the leaders. This isn’t high school — it’s okay to copy from your neighbors.”

The Michigan Chapter of HIMSS (http://www.mi-himss.org/) will be hosting a a full day’s worth of activities in Washington DC on September 24th in conjunction with the National Health IT Week (http://www.healthitweek.org/activities.asp). This event is important because it shows Michigan’s committment to Health IT and the need for the state to work collaboratively to move healthcare improvements forward. This event will spotlight Michigan’s current and future health information technology (IT) initiatives and how they reflect the goals of The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA).