The administration has finished awarding $677 million to create something like a nationwide help desk for the exchange of electronic health records, with Tuesday's announcement of the final two communities selected to offer providers technical assistance.
The Health and Human Services Department will grant CalOptima Foundation $4.7 million to serve Orange County, Calif., while the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative will receive $5.1 million to support the state of New Hampshire.
Over the next two years, a system of 62 so-called regional extension centers will teach providers across the country, especially primary care clinicians, how to use e-health records in a way that meets federal standards.
"The selection of these final awardees means that regional extension centers are now in place in every region of our country to help health providers make the switch from paper-based medical practice to electronic health records," said David Blumenthal, HHS national coordinator for health information technology. "For primary care physicians and smaller hospitals in particular, the RECs will be an important resource to help meet the challenges of adopting EHRs and using them to deliver better care."
Aliya Sternstein
Aliya Sternstein reports on cybersecurity and homeland security systems for Nextgov. She has covered technology for nine years at such publications as National Journal's TechnologyDaily, Federal Computer Week and Forbes. Before joining Government Executive, she covered agriculture and derivatives trading for Congressional Quarterly. She has been a guest commentator on C-SPAN, WTOP and Federal News Radio. She is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.
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