Paper Kills 2.0

How Health IT Can Help Save Your Life And Your Money

Foreword by: Newt Gingrich and Tom Daschle
Edited by: David Merritt

Paper Kills 2.0: How Health IT Can Help Save Your Life and Your Money is a 12-chapter collaboration edited by CHT vice president and national policy director David Merritt with a foreword by CHT Founder and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle.

Paper Kills 2.0 comes on the heels of the one-year anniversary of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009, or economic stimulus package, as well as ongoing health reform negotiations in Washington.

"Despite agreement on the broad goals of improving care and lowering costs, the past year has shown that finding common ground on health reform can seem impossible. While it is important for policymakers to stand their ground when they must, it is equally as important to have the courage to collaborate when they should. Modernizing our system with health information technology is one of those issues," note Gingrich and Daschle in the book's foreword.

Praise for Paper Kills 2.0

“At GE, we talk about ‘healthymagination,‘ our commitment to deliver better health to more people at lower cost. Each of those goals depends upon the same solid foundation—a strong, sustainable healthcare IT infrastructure. This book, penned by some of the industry’s brightest minds, provides a brilliant blueprint through its discussion of issues reshaping healthcare today and how we can act with agility to address the inevitable changes we will face tomorrow.” Jeffrey R. Immelt Chairman and CEO, GE

"Paper Kills 2.0 is a timely book that explores the most important drivers of health IT, from innovation, primary care, and clinical research to open source, electronic administration, and health information exchange. We focused each chapter on the tens of billions of dollars invested through the economic stimulus law to get modern technologies into the hands of doctors and providers," says Merritt.

"This book explains why [health IT] is so important and how it can improve your health," says Mehmet Oz, M.D., Vice Chair and Professor of Surgery, New York Presbyterian/ Columbia University and author of YOU: The Owner's Manual.

"Paper Kills 2.0 is evidence our nation is making progress in solving the complex puzzle of a connected healthcare system," says Michael O. Leavitt, former Governor of Utah and former Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary.

"This impressive collection of materials from healthcare leaders from every industry sector will help us tackle the complex and critical issues we must resolve to ensure an efficient, high quality, modern health system," says U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI).

"Health information technology is vital to helping doctors and patients live healthy and fight chronic disease. It is also vital to finding ways to prevent disease in the first place. I applaud the expertise and experiences highlighted in this important book to help make this happen," says Julie Gerberding, M.D., M.P.H., former Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"This book, penned by some of the industry's brightest minds, provides a brilliant blueprint through its discussion of issues reshaping healthcare today and how we can act with agility to address the inevitable changes we will face tomorrow," says Jeffrey R. Immelt, Chairman and CEO, GE.

Chapter contributors include representatives from Microsoft, Intermountain Healthcare, GE Healthcare, NextGen Healthcare, Siemens Healthcare, StatCom, Cancer Treatment Centers of America (CTCA), Availity, LLC, Greenway Medical Technologies, Misys Open Source Solutions, Surescripts, Inland Northwest Health Services, and the Nebraska Health Information Initiative (NeHII).