The workforce for meaningful use

The discussion about health IT workforce continues to heat up as health care organizations realize that achieving meaningful use of electronic health records will require not only hardware and software, but people who have the expertise to make it happen. That expertise requires as much an understanding of information use and analysis, clinical organization and workflow, and business and management as it does IT, i.e., the substance of informatics.

One recent article describes a developing "war on talent" for health IT workers. The same publication features another article about how health care organizations are "racing" to fill CIO positions.

Finally, an IT publication describes why "your next job may be in health care."

By the way, many people ask me where they can read a succinct overview about "meaningful use," and I have found a nice 6-pager by David Classen of CSC. Of course, the "ground truth" comes from the matrix recommended by the Office of the National Coordinator to CMS, who will set the final rules in the near future.