The Department of Health and Human Services is not stopping when it comes to moving money into the public to support their initiatives. September brought another $184 million of grants and assistance to ultimately help the adoption of EHRs. Here’s the breakdown.
Friday, September 17, 2010, $130.8 Million to Boost Health Professions Workforce. These grants focus on Health Workforce Training, Diversity and Disparities. They will strengthen and expand the health professions workforce. Six areas are targeted: primary care workforce training, oral health workforce training, equipment to enhance training across the health professions, loan repayments for health professionals, health careers opportunity programs for disadvantaged students, and Patient Navigator outreach and chronic disease prevention in health disparity populations. The grants include $88.7 million in funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
Monday, September 13, 2010, $16.8 million to train public health workforce. The grants were awarded to 27 Public Health Training Centers (PHTC) at schools of public health and other public or non-profit institutions across the country.
Friday, September 10, 2010, funds will support rural hospitals’ switch to electronic health records. The nearly $20 million in new technical support assistance to help critical access and rural hospital facilities convert from paper-based medical records to certified electronic health record (EHR) technology. Some 1,655 critical access and rural hospitals in 41 states and the nationwide Indian Country, headquartered in the District of Columbia, stand to benefit from this assistance, which can help each of them qualify for substantial EHR incentive payments from Medicare and Medicaid.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010, $17 Million for Patient-Centered Outcomes Research. The three sets of grants and cooperative agreements totaling nearly $17 million for patient-centered outcomes research (PCOR), or research that compares treatments and strategies to improve health outcomes for patients.