Meaningful use Workgroup to review Timing Options

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Slideshow: Top 10 stories of health care 2010Faced with comments that its meaningful use stage 2 draft recommendations and their associated timelines were too onerous, the meaningful use workgroup, a Sub-Committee of the CNO HIT Policy Committeewill examine how it can enhance the timing of the program, requirements, or both.

Even if it is not at all certain the group will take such action, comments by Paul Tang, MD, VP and CMIO at Palo Alto Medical Foundation and Chairman of the meaningful use work group, said he was interested in exploring all options.

Distilling the feedback from the public, Joshua Seidman, Director of the Division of significant use in the Office of the supplier Adoption Support of CNO, said, "the slope of the curve in terms of raising upward movement bar and chronology," have been expressed as problematic. "There are concerns about the time where, in terms of suppliers and vendors, be able to prepare systems." So if there is new functionality that must be implemented, and the final rule out in mid-2012 as HHS has indicated, how long does allow the implementation of these features? ?

Seidman said some comments recommended that sufficient time be built in the process ONC could inject step 1 lessons learned in step 2.

Another group of letters said that some measures of phase 2 lacked sufficient specificity to comment on informed and asked that more detail be added before the proposals could be properly assessed.

Seidman said that not all comments urged caution. Some, in fact, asked that the momentum of the program continue apace.

Before exploring options to address the question of timing, Tang put the table passing in review the elements of the program which were cooked in statue and, therefore, not subject to Amendment ONC and CMS. He noted, for example, penalties of program constituted an incitement towards compliance in off-years, somewhat compensate for the fact that the lion's share of of incentive money is highly attractive entrance fees. Nevertheless, it is concerned to push too many objectives of significant use in the future.

But the desire to keep the strong Stage 2 as is currently may be difficult, given the effects of training associated with the addition of actions not supported by the current software. "There is the time required of seller-development and implementation of provider and the training time, which are both important and significant.". They must be performed in sequence, they are additive, "Tang told."

However, not all the requirements of MU, require vendors to change their code and, therefore, be recertifié. Measures which called to increase the current thresholds or tapping dormant functionality already incorporated in the products, the time required for compliance would be greatly reduced.

In addition to temper the requirements, Tang suggested ways the timeline could be adjusted.

In a scenario, it has been suggested that it was possible to change the period of Stage 2 of a full year to 90 days (step 1). "This would give a period of nine months to get things done downstream before having to be operational with a fully certified step 2-this is a way to ease the timetable," he said.

Another option, Tang said, was to delay stage 2 in total, perhaps 12 months; While a third option (the one recommended by CHIME) could be behind stage 2 until a certain percentage of hospitals and eligible suppliers reached step 1.

These solutions, Tang said, were not without their disadvantages. "A consequence of the [delay] is that it supports the reform of the health and, as the ACO rules out, suppliers will need an EHR with great care and coordinating exchange functionality, to delay step 2 would affect the whole program [health reform]"he says. ".

Next meeting of the Working Group will be an event in person on April 5, when it will be "go through a list of criteria on the objectives of step 2, and in some way incorporate a discussion of the timeline." The Working Group will then its recommendations to political success Committee on 13 April. On 2 may, Tang said that the Working Group would convene to discuss feedback, that he had received of the political Commission, refining its proposals from step 2. 11, The Working Group will present its stage 2 "package" policy for a second review Commission. "We will then finalise our proposal after this meeting in the preparation of a presentation to the June 8 meeting of the Policy Committee, where we will ask for approval.".

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