Healthcare IT Update

Predict Your ARRA Dollars With This Handy Incentive Calculator

By now we’ve all heard that hospitals that meet ARRA’s criteria get to collect incentives starting at $2 million. The government will then adjust that figure based on your hospital’s Medicare discharges and the year that you make the EHR transition. Buy-and-install or Internet based? Jim Sheldon-Dean shows you how to make the right EHR decision for your health care organization. Just how much will your facility get? That can be a head scratcher. Calculate your anticipated share of funding with this breakdown of the Medicare incentive formula. Formula: For acute care prospective payment system (PPS) hospitals the formula is: Initial Amount times Medicare Share times Transition Factor = Total Incentive Amount The “Initial Amount” is $2 million plus $200 for each discharge between the 1,150th and 23,000thdischarge in a 12-month period. There is no credit for the first 1,149 discharges or discharges…

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Tool Reveals Whether E-Prescribe Will Get Bang For Your Buck

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We’ve all heard that physicians are eligible for e-prescribing bonuses, but will the cost of a new system or upgrade be worth it? The American Medical Association (AMA) has unveiled a new tool to help physician practices decide about e-prescribe. “A recent survey found about 30 percent of physician participants use an e-prescribing system in their practice,” said Joseph Heyman, MD, an AMA board member, in a June 30 statement. “This is a sizeable increase from the 13 percent who said the same at the end of last year.” The AMA’s online portal allows physician practices to calculate time savings and eligibility for incentive payments. Comparison shop: Potential e-prescribe buyers can access the AMA’s “system finder tool” that selects three systems that might suit your practice, based on your responses to a questionnaire. (Note to HIT vendors: Visit the site to see how you and your competitors stack up.) You an access the

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