The ACC recently participated along with Virginia Governor Tim Kaine in a kick-off event for what I consider to be a seminal quality project. We are working with Centra Health, a health care system in southwestern Virginia, to fulfill our vision of using health IT and NCDR to improve quality of care. Actually there were two Governors there--Virginia ACC Governor and QSDC Chair John Brush officiated with Kaine.

Centra will extend electronic health record functionality to allow its physicians in Lynchburg to participate in the NCDR® IC3 Program. IC3 will help Lynchburg physicians benchmark their adherence to ACC/AHA clinical practice guidelines and performance measures. Centra will be the first health care provider in the U.S. to submit inpatient and outpatient data to the NCDR® for an entire community. This case study will last 18 months and will be instrumental in driving adoption of HIT and IC3 nationwide.