NCPA ‘road map’ fosters HIT adoption
ALEXANDRIA, Va. —In a new bid to help independent pharmacy owners join the health information technology revolution, the National Community Pharmacists Association has issued a report called “Health Information Technology and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009: A Road Map for Community Pharmacy.”
The report, issued Oct. 8, is an updated version of what was created in advance of the two-day, NCPA-hosted conference in June with other healthcare industry stakeholders called Connecting Community Pharmacy to the Interoperable Health Information Technology Highway. The new version, noted NCPA, “reflects the…consensus that emerged as a result of the conference.”
Driving the initiative was the massive economic stimulus package known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which included funding to spur adoption of HIT and a national, interoperable healthcare system by 2014.
“ARRA allocates a total of $19 billion to implement health information technology regional exchange networks,” noted the NCPA report. “Of this amount, $17 billion is for incentive payments to physicians and hospitals that implement a meaningful and useful system of EHRs beginning in 2011 with completion by 2014.” Those incentive payments are “directed at Medicare- and Medicaid-certified physicians and hospitals,” the report added, but “the remaining $2 billion is allocated to immediately begin developing and improving the nation’s HIT infrastructure.”
In turn, the stimulus plan “encourages creation of personal health records, developed and owned by individuals in conjunction with healthcare professionals, and portable to all healthcare settings,” NCPA’s report continued. The ambitious goal of this plan, it added, is to create a PHR for all Americans by 2014.
“This scenario creates excitement among many individuals and advocates who believe that an electronic records system creates more efficiency and lowers healthcare costs,” the NCPA reported. “However, such a system presents risks and challenges” in such areas as identity theft and privacy protection, the report warned.
The fast-growing emergence of HIT and the need for systems that protect patient privacy lend urgency to the need for pharmacy retailers to prepare now, according to the independent pharmacy group. “Community pharmacists should begin preparing for a comprehensive electronic healthcare environment immediately,” the report urged. And, “while pharmacies are ahead of most other healthcare professions in computerization for billing and reimbursement, most systems are proprietary and not focused on emerging clinical roles, documentation and interoperability within a larger healthcare environment.”
For instance, noted the NCPA, “few community pharmacy computer systems are networked into the electronic medical record systems of the physician practices with whom they collaborate,” in part because those systems may not be designed “to share important clinical information for medication therapy management services. As such, it is imperative that pharmacists start preparing now to connect to the nation’s emerging HIT infrastructure,” noted the report’s authors.
Among the report’s recommendations: that pharmacies take ownership of the medication management and use process within the HIT revolution, and that pharmacy operators play “an instrumental role in helping create the necessary interoperability standards for the nation’s HIT infrastructure.” NCPA also urged its members to participate in national, regional and state health information exchanges.