BY SHERI PORTER
 "Can you imagine how inefficient it is to use this record when Mary comes in for her visits?" President Michael Fleming, M.D., below, says of paper records at the press event. At left, representatives of three of the AAFP's new EHR partners look on. |
Ten health care visionaries made history here Nov. 12. Meeting at the National Press Club, they announced a bold initiative to improve the efficiency, quality and safety of the health care family physicians deliver.
The press event, "Partners for Patients," was all about electronic health records and AAFP's push to make EHR systems available and affordable to all FPs by forging alliances with leaders in the field. Representatives of the Academy and its new EHR partners spoke at the press event.
What's all this mean to you as an AAFP member? You now can purchase hardware and software discounted 15 percent to 50 percent, depending on the product. And that means the thousands of small- to medium-size practices that have been frozen out of the move to EHRs because of prohibitive cost will now be able to move forward.
To date, the Academy's new partners are A4 Health Systems, GE Medical Systems Information Technologies, Hewlett-Packard, MedPlexus Inc., MedPlus Inc., NextGen Healthcare Information Systems Inc., Physician Micro Systems Inc., Siemens Medical Solutions Health Services Corp. and Welch Allyn Inc.
AAFP's alliances with these partners "place us clearly in the forefront of technological development among all other medical associations," AAFP President Michael Fleming, M.D., of Shreveport, La., said at the press event.
To illustrate just how the move to EHRs will help patients and physicians, Fleming held up a well-worn manila folder housing a patient's chart. "Can you imagine how inefficient it is to use this record when Mary comes in for her visits?" he asked. "What if all of Mary's health records were current, immediately accessible and updatable? And what if everything was at my fingertips every time I saw Mary?"
Mark Leavitt, M.D., GE's vice president for clinical initiatives, said it was no secret that the health care industry has fallen behind in implementing digital technology. "We're about the only ones not participating. We're lagging behind pizza parlors and video rental stores," Leavitt said.
What this initiative offers is not a new product, but rather a new network that will help every product work better, said Jon Zimmerman, Siemens' vice president for e.Health. "We're going to make all of those products talk together. It's time to get busy, because data in motion is data at work."
Each company has pledged to uphold the Academy's four guiding principles of affordability, compatibility, interoperability and data stewardship.
Get more information about the initiative at http://www.aafp.org/centerforhit.xml. Click on "Current Projects," then "Principled Group Purchasing Agreements." You'll find links to the partner organizations' Web sites, which provide product and pricing information. Enter your AAFP ID number to access the links.
This project is evolving at a breakneck pace; the Web sites will be updated as soon as new information becomes available, including possible additional partners.
To reach writer Sheri Porter, e-mail sporter@aafp.org.
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