Show me the Funding for EHRs

My travels across the country have shown me one thing is consistent, health and human services organizations continue to struggle to afford the tools suggested to reduce cost and improve care.  The IOM Study “Improving the Quality of healthcare for Mental and Substance-Use Conditions”clearly suggested that Electronic Health Records (EHRs) would increase patient safety, promote communication between service providers and yes reduce cost of services.  However they still fail to tell us how the sample sites used for this study can find the money!

Add to these challenges statements such as , we will only accept electronic billing, the state/county requires patient charts to be electronic, the US will have an interoperable BH record in 7 years-and most social service, behavioral health or addiction treatment providers dismiss the whole movement as UNOBTAINABLE.  Having been a provider and Information Management Director within non-profits I can certainly see their frustration.

I must admit the one state that I have seen taking huge strides is California.  The MHSA (Prop 63) has targeted many uses for the monies collected and one major focus is technology/EHRs.  I recently presented at the California Institute for Mental Health (CIMH) and was impressed by the high level of enthusiasm and knowledge of how to fund and implement EHRs such as Sequest’s Workflow Systems.  I believe our industry recognize the inevitability, need and benefit of EHRs-I no longer find my self selling the benefits or value–the challenge remains how to fund such enterprise projects.  I do see other states beginning to allocate funds for such projects for providers, hopefully as California goes as will others. 

Bill