Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, has sent letters to 31 U.S. hospitals asking about their experiences in implementing health IT under the $19 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA). He is seeking to ensure the effective and efficient use of taxpayer money in implementing health IT, such as computerized provider order entry systems and EHRs.

The Certification Commission for Health IT (CCHIT) will update both of its EHR technology certification programs to conform to the Interim Final Rule of meaningful use recently released by the Department of Health and Human Services. Applications will begin to be accepted Feb. 12.

The Society of Interventional Radiology (SIR) is standing behind vertebroplasty--a minimally invasive treatment for vertebral compression fractures--despite a controversy that arose over two studies that concluded the treatment offered no benefit over a placebo procedure.

Health Level Seven (HL7) has changed its name to Health Level Seven International to represent its focus on the development of global health IT standards.

Fremantle Hospital in Perth, Western Australia, has installed six Carestream Health's DRX-1 systems in general x-ray rooms across the 450-bed facilitys radiology and emergency departments.

Nearly three-fourths (74 percent) of U.S. health executives polled for a survey on the impact of technology in healthcare reform agree or strongly agree that the American healthcare system is in a state of crisis, according to a report by StatCom.

EHR provider athenahealth has appointed Timothy M. Adams as senior vice president and chief financial officer (CFO).

The National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NAMCS), an annual U.S. representative survey of patient visits to office-based physicians, found that 41.5 percent of physicians reported using all or partial EMR/EHR systems (not including systems solely for billing) in their office-based practices in 2008. The comparable figure for the 2007 NAMCS was 34 percent.