Whole new technologies have developed for treating patients and for managing information. The User's Guide to the Employee Health Benefits Survey is developed and released by the Consortium as a companion to the Employee Health Benefits Survey. In November, Secretary of Health and Human Services Louis Sullivan convenes a forum of national leaders to discuss the challenges of reducing administrative costs in the U.S. health care system. The Consortium's report on State hospital costs is released. The report provides critical information which could help slow spiraling health care costs and assist officials in better shaping priorities in the long term.
Critics attack high administrative costs as the most rapidly growing component of healthcare costs.
Health information systems become an issue in reform. Under the Bush Administration the DHHS creates the Computerized Patient Records Council, which releases a white paper Initiatives Toward the Electronic Health Care System of the Future. The Workgroup on EDI's Report to the Secretary of U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is released. The same law calls for standard electronic transactions, unique patient identifiers, and privacy protection. On September 29th the Consortium announces its intention to lead a state effort to create a sophisticated electronic network for moving, storing and sharing patient information.