Washington, DC (September 7, 2010) – The Personalized Medicine Coalition (PMC), recognizing the vital importance of health information technology (HIT) as an enabler and accelerator for the adoption and development of personalized medicine, announced the formation of an HIT task force to advise the Coalition and educate policymakers on how HIT can best facilitate future breakthroughs in personalized medicine. 

The task force will collaborate with thought leaders to develop specific and actionable recommendations on how to better align HIT with personalized medicine, including how to integrate scientific and clinical capabilities into the HIT infrastructure, how to improve financial incentives to support HIT and personalized medicine innovation, and what future legislative and executive actions are needed to maximize the benefits of the U.S. Government’s $40 billion investment in HIT adoption.

“PMC has recognized that current policies defining investment of federal funds into HIT have insufficiently considered how they can and should facilitate the advance of personalized medicine. As a result, the nation may lose a critical opportunity for transforming health care,” said Edward Abrahams, President of the Personalized Medicine Coalition.  “The work of the task force will inform PMC’s efforts to improve public and policymakers’ understanding of the critical intersection between HIT and personalized medicine.”

The task force will provide thought leadership on how the policymakers and care providers can best structure and implement HIT to maximize patient benefit.  The Coalition will organize seminars and conferences to share insights gained from the task force’s work.

Chaired by Anthony C. Hess, Ph.D., Senior Vice President and Business Unit General Manager at Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), the task force has financial support from both the College of American Pathologists and McKesson Corporation.  A subgroup of the Coalition’s Clinical Science and Public Policy Committees, the task force brings together a diverse group of stakeholders from across health care, including representatives from Aetna, FasterCures, Harvard Medical School, Johnson & Johnson, Oracle Health Sciences and Siemens Medical Solutions, among others.

“As the nation focuses on improving health care quality and access while lowering costs, there is huge potential for realizing the value of personalized medicine, enabled by HIT,” said Hess. “It is imperative to align public policy, emerging technology, product innovation, and clinical adoption as rapidly as possible.”

Contact:

Gwen Gordon
Phone: (202) 589-1770
ggordon@PersonalizedMedicineCoalition.org

About the Personalized Medicine Coalition

The Personalized Medicine Coalition (PMC), representing a broad spectrum of academic, industrial, patient, provider, and payer communities, seeks to advance the understanding and adoption of personalized medicine concepts and products for the benefit of patients. For more information on the Personalized Medicine Coalition, please visit www.PersonalizedMedicineCoalition.org.