IBM Global Financing, the lending and leasing business segment of IBM, announced financing partnerships with four health IT vendors to speed the adoption of EMRs. It's a step in the right direction.

An IBM Global Financing official rightly pointed out that in order for providers to qualify for the federal incentives they have to install EMRs and EHRs today to establish meaningful use under the aggressive timeline set by the Dept. of Health and Human Services. By providing financing through health IT vendors, IBM Global Financing is helping providers get the loans upfront now. Whether the financing arm of IBM establishes more partnerships with other EMR vendors besides Siemens Healthcare remains to be seen. Siemens Healthcare is obviously a heavyweight vendor, but not the right fit for all providers. The other three vendor offerings range from behavioral health solutions, an EMR for smaller hospitals with less than 250 beds, and a lab and clinical information system.

For providers who aren't a good fit with any of the IBM Global Financing health IT partners, there's still HR 3014, the Small Business Health IT Financing Act of 2009, which was incorporated into HR 3854, which passed the House in late October. The bill amends the Small Business Act to include a new small business health IT financing program.

While these two efforts will benefit healthcare providers, the industry still needs more financing options. I hope the beginning of 2010 brings more announcements like the IBM Global Financing partnerships.

And then once the loans go through, it would be great if more EHR and EMR vendors guaranteed that users of their product receive a HITECH Act bonus payment under the 2011 program year like athenahealth does. All of these efforts go a long way toward building trust and success with providers.