We all know that the largest “insurance company” in the US (Medicare and Medicaid) is on board the meaningful use bandwagon. One of the major questions in the healthcare industry is whether insurance companies are going to hop on the meaningful use train as well.

I came across this post on Fierce Health Payer from August of 2010 (that’s a year ago for those keeping track) that talks about four major insurers aligning their pay-for-performance programs with meaningful use. The four payers mentioned are Aetna (NYSE: AET), Highmark, UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH) and WellPoint (NYSE: WLP).

The interesting thing for me is that a year later, I still haven’t seen any real solid movement or announcements from the insurance companies about meaningful use. I may have missed it, so let me know if you’ve seen something, but I imagine one of my readers or someone on Twitter would have pointed out any major meaningful use announcement by private insurance companies.

I suspect that the major insurance companies are sitting back and watching the government’s meaningful use program first. I imagine they’ll be looking at which pieces of meaningful use are actually (excuse the term) meaningful and then use those as a basis for any initiatives that they launch. I’ll be really surprised if any insurer steps out and uses the meaningful use guidelines. They may use some elements, but I’ll be pretty shocked if they support all of meaningful use.

What do you think? How will insurance companies move forward when it comes to EHR and meaningful use?

I get quite a few emails on this blog from various people. Lots are asking questions. Others rip something I said. Others say thanks for writing. In fact, that connection is one of the best reasons to blog. Well, someone asked the following question and I thought I’d open it up for people on this blog to comment about what they’ve seen, heard, experienced, or think should be done by insurance companies to promote EMR. Here’s the question:

Is there any role for insurance companies in this whole EMR area? Afterall, if quality of care can be increases and costs reduced, how can insurance companies encourage or help pay for EMRs?