Health Care Players Agree on EHRs’ Bright Future, Disagree About Timeframe

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

“How soon” depends on effectiveness of federal stimulus, experts say. The “meaningful use” debate continues to make waves as practices grapple with whether or not they qualify for sizable financial incentives. The federal stimulus bill allots approximately $19 billion in Medicare and Medicaid incentives for physicians, hospitals and other healthcare organizations not only to adopt certified EHRs but also to use them in a meaningful way. Early adopters have been promised bonuses, but these bonuses will turn into penalties for players who do not act fast enough, as a recent post on American Medical News reminds us. Where is your practice in terms of a timeline? Will you get the carrot or the stick?

Here’s Who Got the Latest $1 Billion in HIT Stimulus Funds

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

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Want to know who’s getting those ARRA dollars? Here’s the list. If the feds are going to get providers anywhere close to their ambitious HIT implementation goals, we’re going to need a lot more HIT workers. That’s why the Department of Health & Human Services and Department of Labor are shelling out big bucks to train the next wave of ‘meaningful users’. The government has extended about $1 billion in ARRA grants to further develop health information technology (HIT), skills-building and education in the healthcare sector, the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) announced recently.

Shore Up Your HIPAA Compliance Before Enforcement Storm Hits This Year

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

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Tip: You’re not off the hook if the breach is your vendor’s fault. Using electronic health records may cut costs and reduce errors, but they also can increase your compliance risks — and scrutiny from the feds. Wake-up call: You are accountable for compliance even if a third party installs and maintains your records system. Providers will still be responsible for ensuring the same privacy protections as if they did have their own IT department, points out Jim Sheldon-Dean with Lewis Creek Systems in Charlotte, Vt.

HITECH: Physicians Must Meet 25 Criteria To Achieve ‘Meaningful Use’

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

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While waiting for CMS guidelines, some practices have dragged heels on EHR adoption Practices that have been waiting for CMS to define the term “meaningful use” are finally in luck. But as is always the case when the feds are involved, don’t look for a quick one-sentence definition. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Bill of 2009 (ARRA) offers annual bonuses to practices that show “meaningful use” of electronic health records, and in 2015, practices that aren’t showing meaningful use will face penalties. However, the government was slow to issue a definition of the term “meaningful use,” causing some physicians to delay adoption of EHRs because they didn’t want to risk being a non-meaningful user. On Dec. 29, CMS and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology announced that the definition was finally available for public comment. “CMS’s proposed regulation would define and specify how to demonstrate ‘meaningful…

What You Need To Do To Get ARRA’s EHR Adoption Incentive Money

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

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Having trouble plodding through the 555-page HITECH reg? Our experts spell out the basic requirements for collecting cash. If you help to run a hospital or a physician’s office that sees Medicare and Medicaid patients, you might think you know red tape. Well, if you plan on seeing any of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 incentive money for adopting electronic health records technology, get ready for a whole new world of red before you see any green. On Dec. 30, 2009, CMS issued a proposed rule that would implement the incentive payment provisions of ARRA. Payments will be offered to Medicare and Medicaid providers and facilities that adopt and “meaningfully use” electronic health record technology, and this proposed rule is the first indication of how CMS plans to define ARRA’s requirements. The most anticipated part of the reg…

Already Got Great HIT At Your Health Care Organization?

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

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Want $235 Million Dollars? Sometimes providers that already have established HIT systems complain that all the ARRA money is headed towards just getting started with HIT and EMR. But HHS has announced a new grants program aimed at helping “Beacon Communities” build on HIT excellence and take ‘leadership’ roles in health care communities. “In a press teleconference [last] Tuesday, U.S. health secretary Kathleen Sebelius said the new Beacon Community Program grants will help communities of healthcare providers “get a handle” on improving care through the meaningful use of IT,” reports Information Week. These grants will total $235 million. “The grants will not be awarded to healthcare providers to start up health IT initiatives, but rather to communities that are already national leaders in their use of IT to advance healthcare quality, safety, efficiency, and population health…” More from I nformation Week …

Predict Your ARRA Dollars With This Handy Incentive Calculator

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

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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…

A Stimulus HIT Acronyms Crash Course: The Opera

Tuesday, June 16, 2009

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3 Little HIT Acronyms Yes, you read it right. The opera, or the ‘interoperetta.’ If you’re a Gilbert & Sullivan fan, or even if you’re not, you’ve got to check out this 4-minute crash course on the HIT provisions in the stimulus bill. The man behind the ‘music’ is Dr. Ross Martin. He works on HIT for Deloitte Consulting, so he’s a little more … enthusiastic … about HIT than most, reports The Wall Street Journal. Presented by the ‘American College of Medical Informatimusicology,’ the 4-minute masterpiece aims to enlighten the ‘Acronymically Impaired.’ The little ditty gives us a lightening-fast tutorial on terms like: meaningful user, interoperability, stimulus, AHIC, HITSP … and for those of us really in the dark—EHR and HIT. “It was definitely a midnight to two in the morning kind of thing,” Dr.…

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