HIMSS seeks sway over e-records system

HIMSS seeks sway over e-records system

The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) has asked the Obama administration to require that any electronic health-record equipment receiving stimulus funding be certified by a group the association helped to start and run, documents show.
HIMSS, which represents 350 technology vendors and 20,000 members, was a key force behind the decision to include $36.5 billion in the stimulus package to create a nationwide network for medical records.
A Washington Post review last week showed that the group worked closely with vendors, health-care researchers and others to create nonprofit advocacy groups and generate research data to convince policymakers that such a system could save tens of billions of dollars, and that the government needed to subsidize Medicare and Medicaid providers to buy the equipment.
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