Healthcare IT Update

The feds are having providers race pell-mell to implement electronic health records, so it’s nice that they’re stopping to consider how much federal health care program beneficiaries will actually use the new tools themselves.

During 12 weeks next fall, the Department of Health and Human Services will  survey a group of 500 Medicare beneficiaries for feedback on the PHR systems they’ll be using during that time, according to an announcement published in the Government Health IT site. Since last year, Medicare fee-for-service patients in Arizona and Utah have pilot-tested personal health record (PHR) tools that are supposed to help them track their health. The tools are available via GoogleHealth, NoMoreClipboard, PassportMD and HealthTrio.

HHS, together with CMS, want to know more about “why consumers, and specifically Medicare beneficiaries, elect to use PHRs and what functionality they want from a PHR,” the announcement adds.