Look for similar articles under these categories: 

• ARRA,
• EHR,
• Electronic Health Record,
• Electronic Medical Record,
• EMR,
• Meaningful Use

11 responses to "Practical Meaningful Use Details"

1. # David Nagle commented on April 23rd, 2010:

   This is true that the requirements for Meaningful Use, or a governing body to assess such has yet to be established. Although this information is imminent. Feedback from such orgainizations as the AMA have been submitted and in 2011, CMS will propose objectives for physicians and hospitals to meet to be deemed meaningful EMR users. It is a wait and see scenario right now.

2. # John commented on April 23rd, 2010:

   David,
   That’s really my point. We have the proposed objectives and the feedback given, but we don’t have how those objectives will be measured or reported and to whom it will be assessed. Definitely feels like a wait and see, but just wanted to make sure I hadn’t missed something.

3. # Joel commented on April 23rd, 2010:

   What about the EMR/EHR’s? If a practice uses an EMR/EHR that is not “certified”, would this cause issues in fulfilling their meaningful use requirement?

4. # John commented on April 23rd, 2010:

   If you show meaningful use with an EMR that’s not certified, then you still won’t get stimulus money. Unfortunately, we don’t yet know which EMR will actually be considered certified. We’re still in a wait and see mode.

5. # Percent of ePrescribing for Meaningful Use | EMR and HIPAA pingbacked on April 30th, 2010:

   [...] still really disturbed by the fact that we have so few practical meaningful use details. Sure, we have a lot of guidelines and a lot of prognosticators guessing at what they mean and how [...]

6. # David Lee commented on May 1st, 2010:

   John, I don’t think you are missing anything here. I work with providers, CHCs and others around Meaningful Use in a daily basis. I consider myself an “expert” on this topic but it definitely not 100% defined. What I advise my clients is to be ready for changes and “clarifications” while moving forward. First step is understanding if meeting MU in 2011 is right for them. If it is, then start doing some work now. I would not advise wait and see. If you want to get there in 2011, you need to get the work started with what you know now so that you can be better prepared. If there are 10 steps to reaching MU, I think we know enough to take the first 5 steps right now.

7. # John commented on May 2nd, 2010:

   I’d like to see the 10 steps you’re talking about. Want to do some guest blog posts on the steps?

8. # Frank commented on May 13th, 2010:

   John, I think you make a great point and I agree with your concern. While David Lee points out that we may “know enough to take the first 5 steps”, I would not feel comfortable with any assumptions, only what is written in black and white. I worry that the same kind of issues/problems that have occurred with the PQRI program from CMS will also occur with the EMR initiative, particularly in regard to the potentially open-ended definition for “meaningful use”.

9. # John commented on May 13th, 2010:

   Frank,
   I’d love to learn more about what lessons you learned from the issues/problems that occurred with PQRI. I know of some, but I’d love to learn more. I think you’re right that they are similar and we can learn a lot.

10. # Health IT: Puzzling Out the Meaning Behind “Meaningful Use” « The Recovery Act pingbacked on May 17th, 2010:

    [...] John Lynn of the EMR and EHR blog recently linked to a relatively simplified 12-page matrix and a list of 25 objectives for meeting the first stage meaningful use threshold. As you can see, the objectives range from things like tracking patient medications and providing patients access to their health information to more esoteric items like the capability to provide” electronic syndromic surveillance data” to public agencies. [...]

11. # EMR Stimulus Questions and Answers | EMR and HIPAA pingbacked on June 2nd, 2010:

    [...] or not. This question is hard to answer right now. Mostly because we’re missing a lot of the practical meaningful use details which doctors need to know in order to make a [...]