Meaningful Use
As the need for certified electronic health record specialists grows, it is important that healthcare organizations are able to recognize whether potential candidates are EHR-ready, says one consultant.
With the prohibitive and rising cost of healthcare, there has never been a greater need for accountable care organizations, according to Mark McClellan, MD, former administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Farzad Mostashari, MD, the nation's healthcare IT chief, pronounced the graduates of a new health information technology program at Columbia University and Weill Cornell Medical College to be leaders in a healthcare movement that's critical to the nation, as he addressed the graduating class on June 24.
Healthcare IT News interviewed three solo practitioners who have met Stage 1 meaningful use guidelines, and asked what advice they might have for other solo practitioners or small practices.
Texas Health Resources received more than $19.5 million in Medicare incentive payments at the end of May for meeting first stage meaningful use. But according to Ferdinand Velasco, MD, vice president and CMIO, the heath system didn’t do it for the money.
Once electronic health records become nearly ubiquitous, the information within them will enable new applications and services geared toward better population health management, says National Coordinator for Health IT Farzad Mostashari, MD.
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) has made available a free tool to simplify the reporting by physicians and practices of clinical quality measures for meaningful use.
Innovative tools and data that federal health agencies have released to the public can help healthcare providers meet meaningful use of electronic health records, says Todd Park, chief technology officer for the Department of Heath and Human Services. Speaking to an audience at the Government Health IT Conference on June 15, Park offered several examples.
Even doctors who have purchased and successfully implemented electronic health record systems did not always know what they were buying until they were up and running, ONC director Farzad Mostashari, MD, told an audience June 15 at the Government Health IT Conference in the nation's capital.
The opt-in legislation for Maine's health information exchange was met with "clear opposition" by providers throughout the state, but a revised version that is pending the governor's approval, would make it a mandate that providers who are participating in the HIE provide their patients with a separate form to opt-out.