Digital health records are passing a couple key milestones this year. 

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Some 20 years ago, in May 2004, David Brailer, MD, was named the nation’s first national coordinator for health information technology, inaugurating the push to implement electronic health records after President Bush issued an executive order that set the target of widely deploying health information technology. 

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Five years later, the HITECH Act as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, incentivized the meaningful use of EHRs. The incentive program fed federal dollars to support the implementation of digital systems by hospitals, health systems and physician offices. Since then, hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent to put technology in place by the vast majority of providers.

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In many ways, the industry still is waiting to realize exponential benefits from all the blood, sweat and tears of making this transition. Early dividends have included facilitated billing and better record-keeping for some forms of patient data. But some challenges have emerged that are sidetracking progress. Some of it’s pretty basic, like can data be trusted as authentic, and can we be sure it’s coming from the right party and reaching the intended recipient. Some challenges are downright dangerous, like whether cybercriminal activity will derail interoperability and, in fact, jeopardize patient safety and care. 

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These are heavy questions with no easy answers, but wrestling with these conundrums are important if digital records are ever going to be more than electronic ledgers and filing cabinets. Indeed, solving these issues conclusively are critical to bringing the power of computing to bear on patient care. Too much has been invested in the last 20 years to not reach for the highest good possible. 

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• Fred Bazzoli, Editor in Chief

As you read the stories in this package, we hope it will help you: 

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• 1. Measure the progress of digital health records, and what challenges still need to be surmounted. 
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• 2. Weigh the risks of cyberattacks on attaining the benefits of electronic health records systems. 
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• 3. Underscore the importance of data provenance in ensuring the value of digital patient information and mitigating the risks. 
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• 4. Highlight how cyberattacks are increasingly affecting patient safety, and crippling trust in provider systems. 

There is a strong interplay between interoperability, data integrity and data security that the healthcare industry is only beginning to understand. We invite thought leaders to submit articles and viewpoints on these topics to further tease out specifics on these data priorities.

 

Submit your articles here.