Advancing health information technology in
Minnesota and North Dakota.

National Rural Health Resource Center

The National Rural Health Resource Center is a nonprofit organization dedicated to sustaining and improving health care in rural communities.  As the nation’s leading technical assistance and knowledge center in rural health, the Center focuses on five core areas:

  • Health Information Technology
  • Performance Improvement
  • Recruitment and Retention
  • Community Health Assessments
  • Networking

HIT Knowledge Center. The Technical Assistance and Services Center (TASC), a program of The Center, is creating a rural HIT knowledge center that will provide the following HIT resources and services.  HIT education that is relevant to the state Flex grantees and their rural hospitals; ongoing dissemination of HIT information; a rural HIT resource center that will include HIT road maps, readiness assessments, and other tools; and, a cadre of trusted rural HIT experts to provide technical assistance to TASC, Health Resources and Services Administration’s Office of Rural Health Policy, and state Flex Programs. The Center tracks opportunities for HIT, HIT-related legislation, and HIT profiles of individual states through the rural HIT search engine and has coordinated national rural HIT conference with support from Health Resources and Services Administration’s Office of Rural Health Policy.

HIT Education.  The Center hosted a national rural HIT conference in 2007 and another will be held in 2010.  The Center has provided several webinars and conference calls on various topics of HIT for states and hospitals. 

National Rural HIT Coalition. The Center also manages the National Rural HIT Coalition and the National Rural HIT Coalition Workforce Sub-group which is a group of rural HIT leaders and rural health experts that share best practices, barriers of HIT implementation and practical solutions for rural facilities. TASC, along with the Flex Monitoring Team, conducted a survey in 2006 that revealed the largest barriers for implementing HIT in small rural hospitals.  The Center also coordinates the Delta HIT Network.