A recent study by RAND Corp., published in the American Journal of Managed Care, reveals that improvements in quality of care varied among different types of disease.
While considerable improvement in quality of care was documented for heart failure for health systems that had advanced EHRs, outcomes were not similar for pneumonia or heart attack treatments.
What's the overall take away from the study? The researchers concluded that new methods must be developed in order to accurately to determine the impact of healthcare IT on quality of care in hospitals.
Lead author Spenser S. Jones, said, "The lurking question has been whether we are examining the right measures to truly test the effectiveness of health information technology. Our existing tools are probably not the ones we need going forward to adequately track the nation's investment in health information technology."
No doubt the impact of EHRs varies, but Jones makes an excellent point. The healthcare industry is rapidly changing and so are the healthcare IT tools and processes. The tools and processes for measuring quality must also evolve.
It's up to agencies like ONC and other industry quality groups to help develop the new methods of measuring the impact of health IT.
Photo by ginnerobot courtesy of Creative Commons license.
