Meaningful Use

A new HIMSS initiative is working to showcase interoperability at the 2020 games.

While healthcare entities are waiting for EHR vendors to make data more interoperable, a raft of emerging technologies are enabling information exchange in ways that work effectively today, according to Lisa Moon, a partner with the Timmaron Group. 

HIE could be a 'silver bullet' to care improvement, but we're still a long way off from interoperability says one expert – who proposes more inclusive, less restrictive ways to share information.  

Acknowledgement of the value of interoperability – and the desire to implement it – are seemingly widespread in healthcare. So why is the industry still so short of achieving it?

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services also plans to modify 2017 requirements for eCQM data reporting, in response to some hospitals' challenges with EHR upgrades and replacements.

The outgoing department head touts big advancements in access to care, quality improvements and cost efficiencies - thanks in large part to health IT and data-driven innovation. But she points to much work still to be done in the years ahead.

The Office of the National Coordinator for IT released its Interoperability Standards Advisory for 2017, collecting essential standards and implementation specifications for technology developers and clinicians to know.

CMS says it will reduce reimbursements to the providers that don't meet meaningful use by as much as 3 percent.

John Halamka, MD, served the Bush administration for four years and the Obama administration for six. Change in Washington happens incrementally, he says: There is always an evolution, not a revolution, regardless of speechmaking hyperbole.

CIOs from Healthcare IT News Best Hospital IT Departments 2016 share their take on the fate of electronic health records.