Companies await health IT windfall

The Washington Post: A Virginia firm, Vangent, is positioning "itself for a surge of federal spending on health information technology" by setting up a health IT strategy group. "Vangent is likely to face stiff competition for those dollars, but company officials say they expect the firm's reputation as a health-related services provider to serve it well as it bids on contracts." The firm is also involved in civil, defense and national security work, but health services are its largest business. It runs Medicare's "information and assistance program" (Censer, 5/10).

The New York Times: "In the nation's drive to computerize patient records, Jonathan Bush surely qualifies as the most disgruntled beneficiary of the government's largesse - billions in incentives to accelerate adoption by doctors and hospitals." He is the CEO of Athenahealth. "His argument is that the government incentive program, which begins next year, will, given its size and complexity, serve to subsidize traditional health software, which resides on the hard drives of personal computers and servers. The big, old-line vendors like General Electric, Allscripts and Cerner, he contends, stand to gain more than the Web-based insurgents, like Athena," Bush's firm (Lohr, 5/9).

American Medical News: "The Obama administration on May 4 named 15 communities that will serve as federally funded pilot programs for achieving meaningful use of electronic medical records and showing measurable improvements in quality through health information technology"  (5/10).