Wisconsin Health News

The Department of Safety and Professional Services will use a recent federal grant to facilitate connections between the state’s program for tracking controlled substances and electronic health records, per a Friday statement. 

The agency is receiving more than $1.6 million from the Department of Justice for changes to the Enhanced Prescription Drug Monitoring Program.

The money will go toward expanding adoption of direct workflow integrations and making data more accessible to existing electronic health record systems, with a goal of benefiting providers in rural and underserved parts of Wisconsin. 

Department of Safety and Professional Services Secretary Dawn Crim said the program has “been an invaluable tool in the state’s multi-faceted effort to address the opioid epidemic.”

“It has already transformed prescribing culture, and it continues to generate important data about prescribing trends in Wisconsin,” Crim said in a statement. “This additional funding will make it more functional for and more accessible to more providers throughout the state.”

 The department is already pursuing a multi-year project to overhaul the program’s data capabilities, with a goal of finishing that work in 2023.