The Congressional Budget Office recently released cost estimates for legislation introduced last February by Senator Alexander Lamar (R-TN) titled “Improving Health Information Technology Act” (S.2511) www.congress.com.
S. 2511 Section 2 would require the Secretary of HHS, in consultation with private and public stakeholders to recommend ways to reduce administrative requirements related to using EHRs along with the strategy to implement the recommendations.
Section 2 charges the HIT Standards Committee with making recommendations to the Office of the National Coordinator for HIT www.healthit.gov concerning issues related to the electronic exchange and use of health information.
Also, the HIT Standards Committee would be required to identify medical specialties and provider sites where HIT adoption is limited. The Committee would also be required to make recommendations to certify criteria for HIT used by pediatric healthcare providers.
After reviewing the section, CBO estimated that the cost for implementing S. 2511 Section 2 would require four employees each year on average. CBO estimates that the four employees in addition to related information technology and infrastructure spending would cost $6 million over the 2017-2021 period.
S. 2511 Section 5 dealing with interoperability would require ONC to work with stakeholders to develop a trusted exchange framework. ONC would be required to provide technical assistance to health information networks, conduct pilot tests of the framework, publish the trusted exchange framework, plus a directory of health information networks adopting the framework.
CBO estimates that implementing S.2511 Section 5 would require the equivalent of 17 employees each year on average. In addition, CBO estimates that spending on IT and infrastructure to provide technical assistance to HIT developers and to test the exchange framework would cost $45 million over the 2017-2021 period to implement Section 5.
S. 2511 Section 6 would require HIT products certified by ONC to transmit data to and accept data from registries collecting information on individuals with specific medical conditions. Currently registries do not collect information uniformly.
CBO expects that ONC would need to provide ongoing technical assistance to certified HIT developers to ensure they are able to meet these new requirements. HHS would also be required to submit a report to Congress about best practices when integrating HIT into clinical practices by patient safety organizations.
CBO estimates that implementing S. 2511 Section 6 would require four full time employees each year. CBO also estimates that these employees in addition to the spending on IT necessary to test and certify that HIT products are properly incorporating data into a registry, would cost $8 million over the 2017-2021 period.
Go to www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/114th-congress-2015-2016/costestimate/s2511.pdf for the CBO cost estimates would be for each section of the legislation introduced titled “Improving Health Information Technology Act” (S. 2511).