From inception, our strategic clinical IT goals have remained the same:

      Share clinical information and offer decision support to drive
        clinical quality

      Position for continued future success when clinical IT is required

Next on our road map is to accelerate clinical quality management efforts to support evidence-based practice, disease management and population health management. This will also position us well for future data transparency requirements. Together, these initiatives will keep us well ahead of the curve, where we've worked so hard to be.

Reflect How Top Performers Practice
Practices with the vision – and funds – to exploit technology have been able to distinguish themselves in terms of efficiency and care quality. Over the years Medical Associates has leveraged this advantage to earn several top performance rankings:

      Awarded the Physician Practice Connections®-Patient Centered
        Medical Home™ distinction by the National Committee for Quality
        Assurance (NCQA), becoming the first physician practice in the
        Midwest to be recognized as a patient-centered medical home

      Identified as a Better Performing Practice for nine years by the
        Medical Group Management Association

      Maintained an "excellent" rating for six consecutive years from NCQA

Relative to most group practices, we have been at this a long time. Now that requirements are upon us, we're glad to be so far ahead. We also hope those requirements will reflect how Medical Associates has incorporated IT into our practices.

John Tallent has served as CEO of Medical Associates Clinic and Health Plans since 1998. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for various community and business associations, including the Dubuque Chamber of Commerce, the Greater Dubuque Development Corporation, the Dubuque Mercy Health Foundation and the Dubuque United Way. He also is a member of the CEO Leadership Council for the American Medical Group Association and a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives.

	Association of Medical Directors of Information Systems (AMDIS) "The idea of defining [meaningful use] is important," says AMDIS Board President Bill Bria, MD, in an interview with Healthcare Informatics, "but it's probably not as important to AMDIS as the conversation. The conversation is not only amongst our group – the physicians that have the responsibility for HIT leadership around the country – but also with the public and with many other experts." AMDIS in conjunction with Compuware has launched the www.meaningfuluse.org Web site to provide a mechanism to advance a national dialogue and education around "meaningful use." The new site enables visitors to access resources, collaborate, influence and discuss the definition of "meaningful use" and to learn how to take advantage of the HITECH Stimulus funds.