Rep. Ellmers pushes HHS on safety of health technology

Rep. Renee Ellmers (R-N.C.) is still looking for answers from the Health and Human Services Department about the safety risks associated with electronic health records.
Ellmers, who chairs the healthcare subcommittee of the House Small Business Committee, wrote to HHS Wednesday to reiterate an earlier request for information about health information technology.

Ellmers is interested in an Institute of Medicine (IOM) report that said health IT could pose safety risks and called for greater federal oversight.

"Almost five months ago … I wrote to you to request a copy of your plan to minimize health IT patient safety risks and a number of related documents, or the status of those documents if not yet complete, with the documents to follow," Ellmers wrote Wednesday. "Now, just five weeks before the one year anniversary of IOM's report, we have heard nothing from the department about the status of any of my requests. Meanwhile, we continue to see media reports of patient safety risks related to health IT."

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