Authors
Don Rucker
Don Rucker, M.D.
Former National Coordinator for Health Information Technology
Dr. Don Rucker previously served as the national coordinator for health information technology. He previously worked as a clinical professor of emergency medicine and biomedical informatics at the Ohio State University and Premise Health, a worksite clinic provider, where he served as chief medical officer.
Dr. Rucker started his informatics career at Datamedic Corporation where he co-developed the world's first Microsoft Windows based electronic medical record. He then served as chief medical officer at Siemens Healthcare USA. Dr. Rucker led the team that designed the computerized provider order entry workflow that, as installed at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, won the 2003 HIMSS Nicholas Davies Award for the best hospital computer system in the U.S. Dr. Rucker has served on the board of commissioners of the Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology and Medicare's Evidence Development and Coverage Advisory Committee (MEDCAC) and has extensive policy experience representing healthcare innovations before Congress, MedPAC and HHS.
He has practiced emergency medicine for a variety of organizations including at Kaiser in California; at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, where he was the first full-time emergency department attending; at the University of Pennsylvania's Penn Presbyterian and Pennsylvania Hospitals; and most recently at Ohio State University’s Wexner Medical Center.
Dr. Rucker is a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine with board certifications in emergency medicine, internal medicine and clinical informatics. He holds a Master’s degree in medical computer science and a Master of Business Administration, both from Stanford.
Don Rucker's Latest Blog Posts
Don Rucker | October 25, 2018
Today, nearly all non-federal acute care hospitals have adopted certified health IT. New data show that this momentum continues with the introduction of the 2015 Edition Health IT Certification Criteria (2015 Edition), which includes new technical capabilities (such as application programming interfaces) that were not required as part of the prior 2014 Edition. The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology’s (ONC) analysis of 2017 data from the American Hospital Association’s Information Technology Supplement Survey reveals that 93 percent of non-federal acute care hospitals have already upgraded to the 2015 Edition or plan to upgrade.
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Don Rucker | July 12, 2018
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), as part of the CY 2019 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule proposed rule, is proposing a historic shift in the documentation requirements associated with clinician office-based Evaluation and Management (E/M) visits for Medicare. This proposal would help to significantly reduce administrative burdens imposed on the nation’s clinicians, allowing them to spend more time with their patients.
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) was tasked by Congress in the 21st Century Cures Act to work with CMS to reduce clinician burden associated with health information technology.
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Don Rucker | June 19, 2018
Over the past decade, hospitals and physician offices have made tremendous gains in shifting their record-keeping from paper to computerized systems. This transition to electronic health records (EHRs) has engendered frustration among clinicians who expected computers to make their care more efficient, and among their patients who expected timely access to their information and seamlessly coordinated care.
To address these challenges, a bipartisan majority of Congress passed the 21st Century Cures Act of 2016 (Cures Act).
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Don Rucker | April 24, 2018
I remember when visiting a city required paper maps and often actual guidebooks. Today, I tap on a map app on my phone, enter my destination, and review options for getting from point A to point B. In recent years, these applications have expanded to integrate ride-sharing, bike-sharing, and public transit information. Map apps provide two key real-time data points to help me compare the different options: the time it will take to get to my destination and the cost.
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Don Rucker | January 16, 2018
If you’ve heard me speak in the past few months, you’ll know that the focus of my remarks is primarily on ONC’s mission to achieve nationwide interoperability and reduce clinician burden relative to health IT. I emphasize these areas because they are absolutely critical to the health of Americans using our healthcare system.
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