Value and Sustainability in Health IT: Mike Leavitt, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services

HHS Secretary Leavitt at 2007 AHRQ Annual Meeting

Mike Leavitt, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (2005-09), spoke about the importance of value and sustainability in health information technology (health IT). He addressed the first annual meeting of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) in Bethesda, MD.

A Video and Transcript are available.

Introduction

On Friday, September 28, 2007, AHRQ's Annual Meeting focused on HHS' Value-driven Health Care Initiative. The day's content was geared specifically toward individuals and organizations that were interested in becoming Value Exchanges. The day began with a joint plenary with presentations from HHS Secretary Michael Leavitt (2005-09) and AHRQ Director Dr. Carolyn Clancy.

Summary

Secretary Leavitt addressed the critical importance of health care quality improvement. In doing so, he reiterated the need to build a nationwide infrastructure to allow health care to function as a system in the way that other segments of the U.S. economy operate. Secretary Leavitt also described the important role that consumers can play in driving quality improvement, especially through the use of information on cost and quality in making choices about their care. Consumers use of information helps generate incentives for improvement at all levels of health care.

Finally, Secretary Leavitt announced HHS' commitment to providing Medicare performance measurement information at the community level in support of HHS' value-driven health care initiative. Local communities will be able to use that information to provide a more comprehensive picture of quality of care for use by consumers, providers, and others.

Video

To watch the video on your computer, select the link below.

• Value and Sustainability in Health IT: Secretary Michael O. Leavitt (28 minutes, Windows Media®)

If you cannot see the captioning in Windows Media® Player: Press "CTRL + SHIFT + C" (or press: Play > Captions and Subtitles > Captions).

Transcript

• Value and Sustainability in Health IT: Secretary Michael O. Leavitt

Additional Resources

Further information on HHS' Value-driven Health Care Initiative can be found on the HHS Web site at http://www.hhs.gov/valuedriven/.

Current as of October 2007

Internet Citation:

Value and Sustainability in Health IT. Speech by HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt at AHRQ Annual Meeting in Bethesda, MD. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, Rockville, MD. https://www.ahrq.gov/news/sec92807.htm