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A while back I wrote about the great news that the Drummond Group was planning to compete with CCHIT in doing EHR certification. The news coming out of HHS has been slow coming for these new EHR certification bodies, but I just received this email from the Drummond Group. In it they assert that they’re still planning to become an EHR certifying body for purposes of getting EMR stimulus money. Below is the full email:

As our 2009 year closes, we wanted to reach out to the many EHR vendors and interested parties who have contacted us about EHR certification and update you on the current state of our EHR certification program. Like you, we are currently waiting for HHS to release their meaningful use definitions and, just as importantly, their certification requirements. In his recent blog post (http://healthit.hhs.gov/blog/onc/index.php/2009/12/07/marking-the-road-ahead/), Dr. Blumenthal of the ONC indicated the publishing of the plans for the new certification program will not be released until early 2010. This is a bit disappointing as we were expecting this in late 2009. Regardless, we remain very excited about the future of EHR certification.

In this period of waiting, we have been speaking to many industry leaders and stakeholders to gain as much information as we can to ensure our EHR certification program will meet the needs of end-users and be viable for EHR vendors, especially small and medium sized companies. Once we get news of the HHS certification program, we can begin formalizing our EHR certification process. When we know more, we will make sure we keep you updated about our plans.

Thank you for your interest in us and EHR certification. May you and yours have a joyous holiday season and an even better 2010.

Joani Hughes
Interop Certification Coordinator
Drummond Group Inc.
www.drummondgroup.com

Healthcare Informatics has been doing a number of really interesting interviews lately. One of their most recent ones is an interview with RiK Drummond, CEO of The Drummond Group. You may have seen that the Drummond Group will be certifying EHR for ARRA funding. So the interview with Rik Drummond is pretty interesting. It is in 2 parts, but here are some highlights from the first part (since the second part isn’t up yet):

In regards to the cost of EHR certification (looks like Drummond Group EHR certification could still be pricey):

GUERRA: So you don’t have a better sense of whether they feel the current pricing is too high or if the certification process is too long? You’re not getting a more definite sense of what it is they’re coming to you for?

DRUMMOND: We’ve been kind of overwhelmed with a lot of this for the last three or four weeks, so we’re going back to interview some of them just to see what the actual problem is. I should know more in probably three or four weeks.

I expect that this is like normal testing where pricing is always an issue. Every test that anyone does, people think it’s too high because it’s one more cost to add in the end. The flipside is we find that once people understand what pricing gives them – it’s almost the last part of their software cycle – they see the cost is not nearly as high as they would anticipate, because it’s a cost of shifting from internal testing to external testing, and it also gives them a big marketing boon because someone is stamping their seal of approval on you, you’ve met these conditions. And that marketing boon is worth anything, you pay for that sort of thing.

In regards to establishing the EHR criteria and CCHIT certification (glad to see they like the separation of requirements making and requirements testing):

DRUMMOND: We think it’s very important to keep the stakeholder groups who define the requirement areas distinct from the testing parts, if at all possible. That doesn’t mean it can’t be the same organization, but it means you have to have some really clear boundaries. So CCHIT has both of those combined, and we always try to avoid having those two combined very closely.

Our focus would be very much on working with CCHIT, our working in parallel with them, but we all have to use exactly the same test criteria to make this whole thing work. So it has to be defined somehow so that happens. We need to focus on the technical aspects in making everything come together appropriately, so that when people go buy these products they can say, “Well, I’m one step into meaningful use. I have one key component in place. Now, I have to show how I use it to get the rest of it.”

There’s been a lot of talk around the blogosphere about the new EHR certification pathways proposed by CCHIT. However, Neil Versel is reporting on his blog that there’s a rumor that ONC is planning a July meeting with several people that are considering starting up an EHR certification program.

Makes complete sense to me. David Blumenthal does seem open to the idea of not having CCHIT be the sole certification body. Certainly he’ll feel some big time pressure from the various big EHR vendors out there, but I’m hopeful that David Blumenthal will be able to do well and keep at least some competition in the EHR certification process.