Health IT Market to Grow Apace
By
John Pulley
In addition to EHRs, the report says, health IT vendor opportunities include IT infrastructure modernization for governmental health agencies, new medical payment systems, and IT to improve health in the general population.
While the overall economy may well continue to sputter, the health IT market should be hitting on all cylinders over the next five years, a new industry report predicts.
One slice of the market, federal spending on health IT, is expected to grow from $4.5 billion in 2011 to $6.5 billion in 2016, for an annualized growth rate of 7.5 percent, according to a summary of the report, "Federal Health Information Technology Market, 2011-2016." The market report by Deltek, a Herndon, Va.-based software and information services provider, is available for purchase.
Key findings, according to the summary, include:
- Demand for mobility, telehealth, informatics, decision support, interoperability and common electronic health records will be driven by technology advances, potential long-term costs savings and improved patient outcomes.
- Aging EHRs operated by federal agencies "are overly ripe for major transformation."
- The federal government must transition from a "pay for service" model to a "pay for health" model that emphasizes outcomes.
- Health IT adoption is threatened by data security, program integrity, care coordination, political agendas and the federal deficit.
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