There has been a pretty interesting debate about the effect of EHRs on healthcare costs as a result of the initial Health Affairs article, which described a positive (not negative) correlation between EHR use and healthcare costs. The most recent Health Affairs article replies to a posting by the National Coordinator for Health IT, who tried to debunk the major conclusions of the Health Affairs article. I took note of the last paragraph, which says “Finally, Dr. Mostashari’s unbridled faith in technology is mirrored by his belief that ACOs are the next panacea for health costs and quality. That health policy flavor-of-the-month also remains wholly unproven.” In light of the recent CBO report on the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of most of the Medicare demonstration projects to reduce healthcare costs and several articles about the difficulty in reducing readmissions it seems that many of the “next new thing” ideas aren’t proving out in real life.
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