Healthcare information technology is the whole field within the healthcare industry that deals with handling, maintaining, and exchanging information or data about patients. The patient's medical record and the billing that results from provision of healthcare are both components of healthcare information technology. The ultimate goal of advances in healthcare information technology, in the words of the National Alliance for HIT (NAHIT), is to "shape the policy environment and accelerate the implementation of world-class, standards-based information technology aimed at creating the most effective, safe, unified and inclusive health system possible."