DETROIT – Cincinnati and Detroit are the two final pilot communities selected under the new Beacon Community Program that is using health information technology to help tackle leading health problems in communities across the country. Between them they will receive $30 million in government money to help in their work.

ONC chief David Blumenthal, delivered the news Thursday at the Henry Ford Health Center in Detroit , while HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius was in Cincinnati to make the announcement at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine.

Greater Cincinnati HealthBridge, Inc. in Cincinnati and Southeastern Michigan Health Association in Detroit will use health IT in their pilot programs to address health issues that impact communities across the country. They are the final two entities of 17 designated as Beacon Communities.

However, in an interview following the announcement, Blumenthal said: "It's just the beginning of the beginning."

All 17 Beacon Communities were organized well before the grants came out; making them more successful in their endeavors would be a great achievement, he said.
 
The Greater Cincinnati HealthBridge, which will receive $13.8 million over three years, and its partners will deploy its health information exchange to create new quality improvement and care coordination initiatives for patients with pediatric asthma and adult diabetes. One initiative will be focused on smoking cessation.
 
The Southeastern Michigan Health Association (SEMHA) will receive $16.2 million over three years. SEMHA and its  partners in the greater Detroit area will use health IT tools and strategies to prevent and better manage diabetes.

While the applications were scored based on merit by objective review, the Beacon Community Program also looked at the promise that a community has for improving outcomes, geographical diversity, sustainability and strong local support.

"Besides the cogency of their technical plans, they showed a willingness to marshal resources among employers, plans and the state, which gave us confidence to move forward with the award," Blumenthal said.

The biggest impact of the Beacon Communities' use of health IT will be a healthier local population. "This is one benefit we should never lose track of," he said.

The other benefits will be the ability to easily transfer their technical and social solutions to similar health problems that communities across the country face. "This is a social activity as much as a technical activity," Blumenthal added.
 
 The other 15 Beacon Communities were announced earlier this year.

"The Beacon program uses health information technology tools to link health providers and other community-wide resources in new and innovative ways," Sebelius said.  "Under the Beacon program, communities first identify leading health problems that are unique to their community, develop innovative, health IT-related strategies, and work together through community collaborations to implement their strategies and track their performance."
 
The government received more than 100 applications for the final two Beacon program slots.

"We stimulated lots of communities to develop plans," Blumenthal said. "It would be great if we could encourage them to move forward."
 
"Beacon communities are designed to point the way toward maximizing community resources to address specific health goals at the local level, including quality of care, the cost of care, and the health of the whole population," Blumenthal added.  "We have seen first-hand through the Beacon application process that a great many communities have promising ideas and are starting to use health IT in innovative ways.  We look forward to engaging and helping these communities through a broader nationwide effort."
 
To that end, the Office of the National Coordinator is working with community-based private foundations in hopes they will assist applicants that didn't receive awards. ONC is also working with national foundations to help provide technical assistance, as well as creating forums for all applicants to come together and share information.

"Although we could only select two additional Beacon communities, we are incredibly impressed by the creativity and focus exhibited by communities over the course of this competition," said Blumenthal. "Local leadership is an essential ingredient to improving healthcare. The Beacon Community application process provides strong evidence that communities throughout the country are mobilizing for positive change, using health IT as a critical foundation for improving healthcare."

"The federal government has changed the conversation about health IT in the U.S.," he said. "We have created communities that are talking and collaborating on how to get to meaningful use."

The content was altered Thursday at 2 p.m. to add comments from an interview with David Blumenthal, MD, after the he and HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius made the announcement Thursday mornng.