Conducting his first meeting as the national coordinator for health information technology, Farzad Mostashari said that his department is more focused than ever on implementing policies aimed at helping providers adopt electronic health records and making sure that this is done in a patient-centered manner.
Given the fact that the electronic health records incentive programs are just winding up, Mostashari recognized that it is a difficult time for the agency to be adopting new priorities, Government Health IT reports. However, he said this also presents an opportunity to create programs that make sure adoption is done the right way.
"We're moving into a time of intense execution. I know from personal experience implementing electronic health records in small doctors' offices in some underserved communities in New York just how incredibly hard this work is," he said, according to the news source. "We are going to need to execute and continually improve in terms of the implementation of our programs."
The goals could impact the second stage of the meaningful use rules, which the office of the national coordinator is currently developing, which the Department of Health and Human Services expects will be implemented in 2013.