President Bush signed an executive order on Tuesday requiring federal agencies that administer or sponsor federal health insurance programs--the Department of Health and Human Services, the Defense Department, the Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program--to gather price and quality data on medical procedures they purchase and to share them with each other and consumers by Jan. 1, 2007. Medicare beneficiaries, health insurance beneficiaries at the Department of Defense and Department of Veterans Affairs, and federal employees represent about one-quarter of Americans covered by health insurance. The executive order builds on the federal government’s efforts to release Medicare payment information for individual healthcare providers.
Bush’s order also directs the agencies to collaborate with the private sector and government sources to develop programs that assess medical quality, to identify practices that promote quality, and to use interoperable health IT. Each agency must also require that the health IT systems of providers, health plans, or insurers meet recognized interoperability standards. Consumers will be able to access the pricing and quality information from a variety of potential sources, including insurance companies, employers, and Medicare-sponsored web sites.
