Senators question ability of EHRs to support personalized medicine

On Tuesday, National Coordinator for Health IT Karen DeSalvo told senators that health IT is "foundational" to President Obama's Precision Medicine initiative and discussed ways to improve data sharing, Health Data Management reports. In February, President Obama in his fiscal year 2016 budget proposal asked Congress for $215 million in funding for a personalized medicine initiative that centers around the creation of a massive database containing the genetic data of at least one million volunteer participants. During a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing, DeSalvo said that the "comprehensive data picture" formed by analytics, electronic health records, mobile health device information and other data "is necessary to identify the right prevention and treatment that is not only the most effective, but also most desired by the patient".