"NAHIT builds common ground and purpose not only among organizations across health care but among senior executives in different disciplines, such as, operations, finance, strategy, clinical, and technology," says Richard A. Correll, CHIME president and chief executive. "NAHIT brings a unique ability to develop actionable, consensus-based solutions that help improve each organization while improving health care for all of us."

In the next month, NAHIT will transition its work with the Healthcare Supply Chain Standards Coalition to GS1 Healthcare US and wrap up the health IT definitions project for the Office of the National Coordinator of Health Information Technology. At the same time, Horowitz, the board and members are working to determine NAHIT's next initiatives.


"One of our greatest strengths is our representation and consensus-building across health care, and that won't change. But we are sharpening our focus on supporting and empowering the process to deliver more effective and efficient patient-focused care," says Horowitz.

"In the six years since forming NAHIT and seeing tremendous progress on health IT, it has become crystal clear that providers working in tandem with other stakeholders will determine the success or failure of leveraging technology to create a more efficient, safe, unified and patient-focused health system," explains co-chair George Lynn. "Whether it's widespread use of interoperable electronic health records or automating the health care supply chain through global data standards, major advances will only come about if we work together in developing solutions and implementing IT by engaging providers, suppliers, manufacturers and other partners," concludes co-chair John Glaser. "This is what excites me about the possibilities associated with NAHIT."

About NAHIT

The National Alliance for Health Information Technology is a diverse partnership of senior executives from all health care sectors that promotes, influences and supports the effective use of information technology (IT) needed to create change in health care. Collaborating with health care and government leaders, NAHIT identifies and develops solutions to major technology issues standing in the way of achieving a safer, higher-quality, more affordable health system. Since its founding in 2002, Chicago-based NAHIT has helped forge consensus and accelerate progress with important initiatives such as developing an industry-endorsed interoperability definition, defining key health IT terms for the Office of the National Coordinator of Health Information Technology, creating a public directory of health IT standards, influence a critical advance in medication safety by helping shape the FDA's recently proposed bar code rule, and authoring Rules of Engagement: A proven path for instilling, and then installing a CPOE approach that works. NAHIT is a co-founder of the Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology (CCHIT) and founder of the Healthcare Supply Chain Standards Coalition, now part of GS1 Healthcare US. For more information, visit the web site at www.nahit.org.

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