Public and private payers may soon be testing reimbursement strategies for secure electronic messaging between clinicians and patients, if the American Health Information Community has anything to say about it.
The group, which advises Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt on health information technology (IT) interoperability issues, voted in May to urge payers to pilot-test secure messaging to evaluate possible forms of reimbursement, physician work-flow issues, and the impact on patient involvement in their care.
The widespread use of secure systems that allow patients and physicians to communicate by e-mail has the potential to improve quality and lower costs, especially among patients with chronic diseases, Dr. Douglas E. Henley, executive vice president for the American Academy of Family Physicians, said at a teleconference of the American Health Information Community (AHIC). Reimbursement will be essential to stimulating the widespread use of email and other communication tools, said Dr. Henley, who is a member of AHIC.
AHIC also voted to recommend that the Healthcare Information Technology Standards Panel, an independent group that facilitates harmonization of standards, work on defining standards for secure messaging that will be interoperable with electronic health records. Dr. David J. Brailer, the former national coordinator for health IT and the vice chair of AHIC, said the development of standards in this area should move along quickly.
And in an effort to ensure that access to secure messaging is available to all patients and clinicians, AHIC is asking officials at the Health and Human Services Department to look at how to address the gaps in access to computers and the Internet for poor and underserved populations and the safety net providers that provide their care.
AHIC also recommended that the federal government work with state agencies and professional societies to develop new licensing alternatives that address the ability to provide electronic care delivery across state lines through secure messaging systems. This will be especially important in times of national emergency, said Dr. Mark McClellan, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and cochair of AHIC's chronic care workgroup.
In another recommendation, the group called on the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality to look at existing studies on health IT use by the elderly, ill, and underserved populations.