Meaningful Use of HIT to Transform Health Care, Tang Says at Huntzinger Management Group Event

PLAINS, Pa., March 18, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Meaningful Use is preparatory for health reform, leading to better health, better care, and more affordable care. US private markets failed to achieve widespread adoption of EHRs, requiring public policy to stimulate increased implementation and effective use of HIT, Dr. Paul Tang said at a recent Huntzinger Management Group (HMG) event of approximately 60 healthcare professionals during the 2013 Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Conference in New Orleans. HMG is a leader in healthcare advisory and managed services consulting.

Tang's presentation, "Meaningful Use of HIT: Health System Change We Can Believe In," focused on the context of health reform, the "whys" for Meaningful Use, and creating a data-driven platform for reform of healthcare delivery.   

"Dr. Tang discussed the tools we need to be successful in using Meaningful Use as preparation for health reform," said Robert Kitts, HMG Executive Vice President and Director. "Meaningful Use of HIT will give Americans access to higher quality care at affordable prices and will result in an overall improvement in the health of this country."

HIT policy is enabling health reform by raising the bar for EHR, accelerating provider change, reshaping quality measures, and establishing the information platform to drive health system performance needed for reform.

Tang explained how the HIT Policy Committee was exploring new approaches to stage 3 of the Meaningful Use program. The committee is aligning the objectives with improvements in health outcomes and considering "deeming" partial satisfaction of the Meaningful Use requirements by good performance on quality measures. 

About The Huntzinger Management Group, Inc.
HMG provides advisory and managed services consulting to the healthcare industry. We focus on clinical and operational business performance optimization by ensuring alignment between IT, clinical, and ambulatory areas to position our healthcare clients for the future. For more information, visit www.huntzingergroup.com.

About Dr. Paul Tang
Paul Tang, M.D., M.S., is Vice President, Chief Innovation and Technology Officer at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation (PAMF), and is Consulting Associate Professor of Medicine at Stanford University. Dr. Tang directs the David Druker Center for Health Systems Innovation and also oversees PAMF's electronic health record (EHR) system and its integrated personal health record (PHR) system, MyHealthOnline (formerly PAMFOnline). Dr. Tang received his B.S. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University and his M.D. from the University of California, San Francisco. He completed his residency in Internal Medicine at Stanford University and is a Board-certified practicing Internist. For more information, visit http://www.pamf.org/Internal/.

SOURCE The Huntzinger Management Group, Inc.