MEDICAL DATA: PROJECT TO SET PATIENT RECORDS STANDARDS
The Pacific Business Group on Health, a group of 33 majorThis is part of the California Healthline Daily Edition, a summary of health policy coverage from major news organizations. Sign up for an email subscription.
California employers, and the National IPA Coalition have
"recently joined with several leading medical organizations
representing HMOs, doctors and hospitals to develop an advanced
data communications system for health care in the state," the Los
Angeles Times reports. Though health care payers are demanding
more data on treatment outcomes and utilization, "[t]hey are
finding ... that the medical industry is poorly equipped to
respond to the request." David Hopkins, PBGH's health
information development director, "says that the San-Francisco-
based ... group believes that the health-care system's lack of
computer standards is wasting significant amounts of money." He
said, "Every industry, including banks, has adopted some kind of
computerized standard (for collecting data), and we can't
understand why health plans haven't done it previously." Jack
Lewin, executive vice president of the California Medical
Association, said "that better medical data will be crucial to
the success of doctors working in managed care in the future."
Lewin said, "Nobody has created a public utility model in which
HMOs, doctors, hospitals and health-care purchasers actually
collect information in a standard form and then compete based on
medical results. If we can make it happen, the big winners will
be patients." The groups seeking to establish computerized
standards for medical data have been awarded a $1.2 million grant
from the California Healthcare Foundation; other participating
groups include the California Association of Health Plans, the
California Medical Association and the American Medical Group
Association (Olmos, 11/19).