InfoGard Laboratories, the nation’s first accredited IT security testing laboratory, is approved by the Health and Human Services, Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT as an ONC-Authorized Testing and Certification Body (ONC-ATCB) for the certification of Complete EHRs and EHR Modules for both ambulatory and inpatient settings. -Source

And now there are three official ONC-ATCB for EMR vendors looking to get their EHR software certified. Looks like InfoGard has been doing NIST certifications for a long time now and EHR certification will just be another certification for them.

Info Gard will be the third officially approved ONC-ATCB alongside Drummond Group and CCHIT which were announced previously. There’s also been rumors that Weno Healthcare is trying to become an ONC-ATCB as well.

Maybe I’m just missing it, but I wasn’t able to find other details on InfoGard’s EHR certification plans, pricing, and timeline. If someone else finds it, please let me know. It’s a little disappointing that their press release didn’t include a link to this type of information like Drummond Group and CCHIT did.

Drummond Group has recently published an FAQ about EHR certification. I’m guessing that the FAQ will continue to grow over time. They do cover some important topics. Here’s one of the FAQ that I found particularly interesting (and pretty sad too).

Q: My software is developed for a specialty practice (e.g. dental, etc.) and some criteria are not relevant for my customers. To be a Complete EHR, do I still need to certify over all the criteria?

A: There is not a specialized criteria set beyond the general categories of ambulatory or inpatient, and thus specialized software are required to satisfy the same criteria as general EHRs. The concept is that even if a user will not utilize all the features of a certified EHR that the certified EHR must still have this functionality present within it. Regarding criteria that do not fit a specialty’s typical use, ONC address this type of situation in their Standards and Certification Criteria Final Rule. They talk more of the situation with ED/inpatient settings and comments that growth charts are not needed. Here are the relevant sections that show the aggregated comments they received and their response.

Comments.  A few commenters noted this certification criterion applies more

directly to specialties that predominantly treat children.  For other specialties, this criterion would add unnecessary cost and complexity to many HIT products that they would use.  Many commenters suggested that a growth chart component should not be required for EHR technology designed for an inpatient setting, as it is not feasible to track this data in a meaningful way over a long enough period of time in an inpatient setting (which is typically of a short and infrequent duration).  A couple of commenters suggested that non-traditional forms of growth charts should be accepted.  One commenter suggested that the certification criterion establish a baseline, but should not limit the expansion of this capability to other ages.  Other commenters made specific suggestions for different age ranges, such as including children under the age of two and lowering the upper age to ages less than 20 years old (e.g., 18).

Response.  As we stated above with respect to the calculation of BMI, we believe

that Certified EHR Technology should be capable of performing this capability

regardless of the setting for which it is designed.  Moreover, with respect to whether growth charts should be applicable to Complete EHRs and EHR Modules designed for an inpatient setting, we remind commenters that children’s hospitals qualify as eligible hospitals under the Medicaid EHR incentive program and will also need to demonstrate meaningful use of Certified EHR Technology.  We do not preclude Complete EHR and EHR Module developers from designing novel approaches to displaying growth charts.  Finally, we concur with the commenter that suggested this certification criterion should be a baseline.  We reiterate that this certification criterion establishes a floor, not a ceiling, and we encourage Complete EHR and EHR Module developers to include additional functionality where it will enhance the quality of care that eligible professionals and eligible hospitals can provide.

Today we got news of the new ONC-ATCB EHR certifying bodies: CCHIT and Drummond Group. However, this is really just the start of the EHR certifying bodies. ONC released that “Applications for additional ONC-ATCBs are also under review.”

One of those possible additional ONC-ATCB EHR certifying bodies is Weno Healthcare. This EMR Daily News guest blog post (Thanks Michelle for pointing it out) asserts that Weno Healthcare has submitted their application to be an ONC-ATCB EHR Certifying body. They also offer this interesting insight:

Until recently, only one body was promoted to do this testing and certification. Because of no competition, their prices were out of the ballpark for smaller technology companies who may have built the better and cheaper mouse trap for doctors and hospitals, but could not afford the fees for certification. The technology companies that certified their products earlier are not considered certified by the new rules today, so all technology vendors must go through an ONC-ATCB in order to be re-tested and certified, if they choose to do so.

If Weno is approved as an ONC-ATCB, more technology vendors can afford the testing and certification fees. Weno savings can be as much as $19,000 for complete EHRs. These savings will certainly provide physicians and hospitals with more cost effective certified technology options to choose from. Again, competition is a good thing because it brings prices down and quality up.

Comparing the Weno Healthcare EHR certification price above with the CCHIT and Drummond Group EHR Certification prices, it’s going to be really interesting. That puts the costs of EHR certification (not counting software development costs) at:
Weno Healthcare: $14,000-18,000
Drummond Group: $19,500
CCHIT: $33,000

Of course, this assumes that Weno Healthcare becomes an ONC-ATCB and that the prices don’t change. I won’t be surprised if they do change. Plus, there could be other EHR certifying bodies.