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CBO Director Orszag Says Health IT Holds Promise, But No Panacea for Health Care Costs

Orszag said that while a recent RAND study concluded that broad adoption of health IT could lead to annual savings of about $80 billion, the findings were based on studies "demonstrating positive effects" of the technology and the study projects "potential" not "likely" savings. Orszag said that health IT is not going to "magically bend the health care cost curve." He added, "I'm not saying you shouldn't be excited about health IT. You need to calibrate your excitement in a context of needing other things as well."

Orszag said that "there are health IT savings that are possible on the small scale," but nationwide adoption of health IT would be needed to achieve maximum savings and efficiency. He also advocated the implementation of policy measures on a nationwide scale, saying that the real change will not occur unless the federal government imposes penalties on physicians who refuse to adopt the technology.

Sara Rosenbaum, a health policy researcher at George Washington University and a panelist at the forum, noted that a recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that "fully functional" electronic health record systems adopted by physicians improve quality of care but that the majority of physicians do not use such systems. Rosenbaum said, "Adoption (of EHRs) is not pain free, which probably helps explain why there are so many non-adopters," adding that the high cost of switching to EHRs and difficulty in finding a system that meets physicians' needs are significant barriers to adopting the technology (Cooley, CQ HealthBeat, 6/20).