At a HIMSS09 town hall meeting on Sunday, Rep. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) called the $19 billion investment in health IT by President Obama a necessary "leap of faith," adding that IT will be the "backbone" of health reform efforts.
Whitehouse also said he understands providers' urgency in defining the "meaningful use" of health IT for additional Medicare payments, and that the new HHS secretary will likely be tasked with coming up with that "difficult and complicated" definition. He added that HHS may decide to focus on a particular disease, location or model, to demonstrate meaningful use.
To read more about Whitehouse's speech, take a look at this article in Healthcare IT News.