Don Rucker, MD, national coordinator for health IT, spoke to the importance of interoperability and EHR usability during June 9's Direct Exchange Workshop in Washington, D.C., according to the Politico Morning eHealth newsletter.
Although Dr. Rucker did not lay out concrete plans to reach these goals, he noted the ONC is working with CMS to address physician data entry time. He also commented on the necessity of individual patient ownership of data, saying "it is central to a lot of the things that need to be accomplished,", according to Politico.
The recent budget proposal, which would slash the ONC's funding by $22 million, didn't seem to worry Dr. Rucker, according to Politico. He said the cut represents how the ONC's mission has shifted from adoption to information sharing, Politico reports.
“Everybody else [uses] computers to create less work for themselves," Dr. Rucker said, according to Politico. "We've… used computers to create more work for ourselves."
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