Former U.S. senators find common ground on health IT

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WASHINGTON – Two former U.S. senators, one a Republican, the other a Democrat, do not have to cross the aisle to work together. Tom Daschle, the Democrat who represented South Dakota from 1987 to 2005, and Bob Bennett, the Republican who represented Utah from 1993 to 2011, pretty much see eye to eye these days – at least on the subject of health information technology.

Healthcare information technology is a topic that is front and center at the Bipartisan Policy Center, which was founded by Daschle along with other former senators – George Mitchell, Bob Dole and Howard Baker. Bennett joined the center as a senior fellow this past February.

On April 26, Daschle and Bennett joined the nation’s new healthcare IT chief Farzad Mostashari, MD, on a panel that explored the challenges of converting the nation’s healthcare system from one that is mired in paper to one that is digital and interoperable.

Daschle described the U.S. healthcare system today as one that is not a system at all. “We have a marketplace and a collage of systems,” he said. “What we have is a 21st century operating room and a 19th century administrative room,” he told an audience gathered at the nation’s capital to hear the three men speak.

Daschle said there are too many “stovepipes” in healthcare. It’s hard to find the right data at the right time, he said, and healthcare is the least transparent of all the sectors of the economy. “If you can’t see it, you can’t fix it,’ he said.

On the fix-it end of it, Daschle sounded hopeful.

“We are at the most transformational time in our nation’s history as it comes to health,” he said.

Bennett (pictured at right), who billed himself as “a Republican who believes that not all spending is inherently evil,” said “everybody is in favor of health IT. In the information age, it’s crazy not to be.”

He warned, however, of major challenges ahead, especially on the privacy and confidentiality front.

He also zeroed in on the difference data can make in improving patient care, using one example from Intermountain Healthcare in his home state.

There was a time when getting infections resulting from surgery down to 2 percent was considered the best any healthcare system could do.

However, feeding a vast quantity of data into computers, Intermountain was able to identify all the variables – something that a single doctor alone would not even notice. Intermountain discovered that an antibiotic administered within one hour of an operation would be most effective at preventing associated infection. The health system was able to bring its infection rate down to 2/10 of 1 percent. But, it cost Intermountain $27 million a year, he said, because the organization was not able to bill for this type of work as part of curing the infection.

“If the cost goes down and the quality goes up, you’re using IT correctly,” he said. “Those are your metrics.”