Farzad Mostashari, MD, the newly minted national health IT coordinator, recently offered a snapshot of the near-term direction for the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT as he saw it, steady on the current path but aware that "nothing stays still, and certainly not in health IT." As Mostashari takes leadership, ONC is preparing to develop three proposed rules by the end of the year for stage 2 of meaningful use and the accompanying standards and certification criteria for electronic health records. ONC will also propose a governance rule to support the expansion of the nationwide health information network to promote sharing of patient data. ONC is coordinating with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to develop the regulations for the meaningful use of certified EHRs that healthcare providers must fulfill to qualify for Medicare and Medicaid incentive payments. "There's a tremendous amount that needs to be done relatively quickly," Mostashari said at the most recent Health IT Standards Committee.
