Unless you're in an industry like retail, the weeks leading up to the holidays are a time when a lot of people use up vacation days and catch up on end-of-year chores. But I suspect that for many folks in healthcare, the holidays this year will be more hectic than usual.For the clinicians, the winter months are always busy--caring for large numbers of patients with flu and other seasonal health problems. Dealing with H1N1 outbreaks this holiday season could be making it more difficult than usual for some clinicians to slow down. But for health IT officials--especially those in D.C. hammering out the near-final details of the meaningful use definition--the next week or so will be a race to meet deadlines.

While the Health IT Policy Committee, which is working on "meaningful use" and other details of the $20 billion health IT stimulus programs, met yesterday, there were no announcements from the group about the long-awaited, near-final definition of meaningful use. Some suspected that announcement could come this week, since it's mid-December and that's when many in the industry assumed the proposed rules would be done.

Still, "the issuance of the NPRM [notice for proposed rulemaking] for meaningful use remains on target before the end of the year," said a spokeswoman for the Office of National Coordinator for Health IT in an email to InformationWeek.

"From there, a 60 day comment period will take place. The final definition will come after the comment period is closed, comments reviewed and analyzed."

That means the remaining days of December--not to mention early 2010--will be frenzied for government health IT officials and experts in the private healthcare community who are advising the Obama administration on meaningful use.

I suspect the next couple of weeks will also be a little suspenseful for CIOs and other IT leaders at healthcare organizations that are waiting to move ahead in coming months with their health IT strategies but want to know the last details of meaningful use first.

Regardless of how you'll be spending your holidays, I hope they're happy and healthy. See you in 2010!

Blue Cross of Northeast Pennsylvania, the University of Louisville School of Medicine, and a range of large and small healthcare providers are using mobile apps to improve care and help patients manage their health. Find out how. Download the report here (registration required).