Incentives lower costs of e-prescribing
The state medical society and two insurers are encouraging doctors in Massachusetts to adopt electronic prescribing.
By Tyler Chin, amednews staff. Nov. 24, 2003.
The Massachusetts Medical Society and two health plans have launched separate initiatives to make electronic prescribing more affordable to physicians in the state.
On Oct. 31, two rival health plans -- Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Massachusetts and Tufts Health Plan -- announced they will jointly spend $3 million to roll out e-prescribing technology to the 3,400 highest prescribers in their networks. The prescribers, representing about 16% of the approximately 21,000 practicing physicians in Massachusetts, will receive free BlackBerry and PocketPC handheld devices from the health plans.
The insurers also will pay for a year's worth of subscription fees for the technology from Dallas-based Zix Corp. The insurers also will cover the cost of eight months of wireless service or three months of high-speed Internet access, said Robert Mandel, MD, an ophthalmologist and vice president of provider enrollment and services at the Blues plan. Physicians who opt to participate in the voluntary program will pay a portion of the carrier fees, which range from $50 to $100 a month, he said.
The state medical society's initiative also seeks to entice doctors to prescribe electronically by making the technology more affordable.
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