Thank you for your question.
I will begin and then maybe turn it over to Mike.
Yes, we've actually had two reports done in terms of the cost and the benefits. One was by McKinsey and the other was by Booz Allen. I can't remember in 2005 which one it was. I think it was the Booz Allen one. At that time, when it was all said and done, the costs were in the range of $10 billion to $12 billion, and the benefits would range anywhere from $6 billion to $7 billion on an annual basis.
One of the things we've done, which is quite unusual to Canada in this particular field, is very early on we brought in some of our top researchers in Canada and international researchers and we set up a benefits evaluation framework. For everything we invest in, we do the evaluations. I gave you examples in telehealth, in drugs, and in diagnostic imaging. We can show the benefits occurring from each of them.
Right now we are doing investigations in the expenditures for EMR records in doctors' offices and in laboratory results as well. I must say the benefits that are starting to occur are absolutely tracking in the same way as were the forecasts from both Booz and McKinsey.
There are some swings. At times you'd think you're going to get possibly a reduction in duplicate testing. That doesn't always materialize because clinicians want to reorder a test. There are other areas, in aspects of drug abuse, for example, where we've underestimated what the benefits should be.
Absolutely, we are tracking in those directions. We believe that in the last five years the cumulative benefits from just three programs is over $6 billion.