Humboldt County Health IT Group Reports Progress
A health information technology committee created by the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors aims to coordinate efforts to reduce medical errors and increase the IT adoption rates for small physician practices in the county, the Eureka Reporter reports. The 15-member committee includes clinicians and patient advocates.
In its first year, Martin Love, co-chair of the committee, said it completed a project that linked a 5,000-patient diabetes registry and all the major laboratories in the county. Love said lab results, imaging records, physician e-mail, billing and insurance information, and signatures will be high-priority health IT functions over the next five years.
Love also identified five presentations that the committee has seen to help determine the county's direction for health IT investments. Four information sessions for clinicians are scheduled for this fall to address topics such as how to choose an electronic health record, how to install an EHR and a retrospective of the EHR experiences from a Eureka family physician practice (Harrison, Eureka Reporter, 9/2).