Health care transforms, Gingrich gives thoughts

Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House of Representatives, participated in the Center for Health Transformation’s Healthcare that Works presentation at the Washington Press Club.
A panel of speakers presented data on the need for robust and universal computerized medicine for safety and cost savings. Gingrich said government could save much more by promoting private sector best practices than by just funding benefits.
Merrill Mathews, PhD, said centralized accounting could combat fraud totaling billions of dollars annually. He said the private sector has much better control of this, and should be the model.
Brandon Savage, MD, of GE Healthcare, said electronic patient records Could be modeled on ATM software which already provides fast access no matter where the user is, while remaining secure. Gingrich added that such records could monitor medical errors, medicine conflicts, allergies, etc.

According to Donald Doak, EBSCO Publishing, 40 thousand to 90 thousand lives a year might be saved . He also said Evidence based (objective, statistically supported best practices) medicines is derived from, and distributed by, networked databases.
Gingrich said that he had tried to encourage electronic medical information reforms under Bush for six years; now they are part of Obama’s package.
In a broader concluding statement, Gingrich also proposed tripling NSF funding, based on a “generational investment strategy”: the payoff is huge, but delayed. “My biggest mistake as Speaker was not doing that.”
Dr. Rita Colwell, former director of the National Science Foundation, endorsed Gingrich’s estimate of needed funding.

The entire presentation will be available as a video at www.healthtransformation.net