White House Visit Promotes HCC Partnership with DAS

As a representative of higher education from the Florida Nature Coast, Linda Prescott was invited to attend a meeting on June 6 in Washington, DC of The White House Business Council and Business Forward. She joined senior Obama Administration officials and fellow business leaders from the Greater Tampa area for a forum on jobs and the Florida economy. Over the past year, the White House Business Council has hosted over 500 meetings with business and civic leaders in all 50 states, Washington DC and Puerto Rico.

The meeting was an interactive dialogue about what’s working and how the private sector and government can collaborate more effectively to foster greater opportunity, innovation and job creation—and create the blueprint for an American economy built to last. Mayor Bob Buckhorn attended the meeting and a welcoming reception was held at the Florida House with Senator Bill Nelson and Representative Kathy Castor as hosts following a tour of the White House. One of the reasons Linda was invited was because of an educational partnership she and the Office Administration Department at the Ybor Campus is forming with Doctors’ Administrative Solutions to provide Electronic Health Record Training.

In February 2009, President Obama signed into law the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), Public Law 111-5. The stated goals of the ARRA were to jumpstart the economy, create or save jobs, and build the foundation for long-term economic recovery. Among other things, the ARRA includes $17 billion of incentives to hospitals and physicians who adopt certified EMRs and become “meaningful users.” Doctors’ Administrative Solutions (DAS) was founded in 2003 to implement Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems (then called EMR) in order to improve physician productivity and effectiveness; early adoption, however, was slow.

Then the ARRA succeeded in its stated goals, increasing physician practice adoption to over 40% in the Tampa Bay area from under 10% in just a few years, with the expected adoption rate growing to nearly 80% within the next two years. As a result of ARRA, DAS, a small entrepreneurial company, has added over 20 direct jobs (and is expecting to add more). Several recent studies have shown that implementing this technology measurably reduces cost, improves key health indicators, and saves lives.

The collaboration between HCC and DAS is the next logical step in making a key difference. HCC and DAS are planning to work together to provide real-life technology in the classroom, accelerate the learning curve, and as a result, provide quick access to “shovel ready” jobs. In addition, we expect to have access to dozens of available positions within our client practices for students each semester. Not only does this help with employment, it will also help the physician practices … which will then have new hires who are pre-qualified and immediately productive. By providing a public-private partnership, HCC and DAS will be further accelerating job creation and technology adoption … adoption that will improve health, reduce healthcare cost, and save lives.