January 26, 2012
We’re only about a month into 2012 and there’s no doubt this is going to be a busy year from a regulatory perspective. Our Cerner family will continue to make great progress toward attesting to Meaningful Use. The first performance period for the hospital value-based purchasing program will conclude, and the pay-for-performance era will formally begin here in the United States. Hospitals will become financially accountable to 30-day readmissions. A handful of you will be well on your accountable care organization journey. While these initiatives all have a direct impact on health care organizations, we cannot overlook another initiative likely to have the broadest impact on health IT since Y2K.
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January 18, 2012
With the first year of Meaningful Use participation behind us, HHS has begun sharing program statistics. In fact CMS has been providing general program updates to the Health IT Policy Committee for a few months now. HHS recently released, for the first time, a Meaningful Use attestation data set. This data provides the ability to see how many eligible hospitals and eligible providers (EPs) have attested through November 2011. Further stratification can be done by vendor, state, specialty, etc. This report also distinguishes whether the certified EHR used for attestation received complete or modular certification. It’s important to consider these terms when using the HHS data to gain perspective on the HIT industry.
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June 23, 2011
Much has been written about the final recommendation that the HIT Policy Committee (HITPC) submitted to the Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) for HIT regarding the timing of Meaningful Use Stage 2. The purpose of this blog post is to restate the facts about the recommendation and discuss what this may mean to your strategy.
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June 14, 2011
When my team implemented Cerner’s Ambulatory EHR 16 months ago we were changing culture from writing paper charts to an EHR. As a physician, I had the same fears as many of my peers have, but as a staff, we did it whole heartedly and adopted the solution with the urging of our affiliated hospital, Doctors Hospital of Renaissance, which implemented Cerner Corporation’s solutions.
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May 26, 2011
Syringa Hospital and Clinics is a rural acute care facility located in Grangeville, Idaho. In early 2011, Syringa went live with Cerner solutions and is currently working closely with Cerner’s Regulatory Compliance Team as they move toward meeting Meaningful Use. We had the pleasure of interviewing Darla Anglen-Whitley, Syringa’s EHR implementation project manager about her experiences.
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May 05, 2011
In an earlier blog post, we discussed the impacts of the ONC policy on what it means to have to “possess” all of what is in a vendor’s complete EHR certification, and how that may impact those of our clients who look to rely on our complete EHR certifications to support their Meaningful Use attestation. We now want to turn our attention to the other avenue that is available for clients to consider in their Meaningful Use attestation as the basis for their claim for use of certified EHR technology.
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April 26, 2011
Since our last blog post,we have received many questions about which certifications to use for attestation among those we have available for clients to reference on the Office of the National Coordinator's (ONC) Certified Product List (CHPL). We would like to try to clear that up a bit.The first question clients should ask is what makes the most sense for their organization based on their circumstances and the timing of their attestation. While these categories may not precisely categorize all of our clients seeking meaningful use attestation, thinking about them in this way can be instructive.
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April 18, 2011
At River Falls Medical Clinic, the basic question we ask whenever we embark on any kind of endeavor is how does this help our patients? From the day we began using Cerner’s Ambulatory Electronic Health Record solution in 2010, it was our goal to utilize the EHR to its full extent for the benefit of our workflow and the care we deliver to our patients. When the government announced Meaningful Use requirements, we were quick to notice that the proposed criteria would help us to better utilize our EHR to give our patients things they are not getting now. We eagerly jumped on board and made it our own personal goal to be prepared to “push the button” on April 18 – as one of the very first physicians in the country to be Meaningful Use certified.
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March 29, 2011
Recent policy clarifications made by The Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) have brought the real meaning of “Complete EHR” to the forefront, creating lively discussion within the industry. The clarifications, which were posted in the FAQ sections 17 and 21, explain that for a hospital or eligible provider to make use of any part of a vendor’s Complete EHR certification as part of their Meaningful Use requirement, the provider must “possess” all of what is in a vendor’s Complete EHR certification list.
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March 09, 2011
Glen Falls Hospital is the largest hospital between Albany, NY and Montreal, Canada as well as a comprehensive healthcare system with 28 regional facilities. Glen Falls has been working closely with Cerner’s Regulatory Compliance Practice team to implement new functionality, understand and interpret Meaningful Use regulations, and better understand gaps toward achieving Meaningful Use.We had the pleasure of interviewing Keith Rathbun BSN, RN from the Information Services team at Glen Falls Hospital about this collaborative effort.
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February 03, 2011
USA Today recently ran an article highlighting a federal stimulus program developed to bring broadband Internet access to rural areas of the country. President Obama reinforced the importance of this initiative in his State of the Union address last week as a requirement for attracting and keeping business in the United States. The ability for businesses in rural areas to send and receive information as quickly as their urban counterparts is vital to their continued sustainability and ultimately to the livelihood of their communities. But it’s not just about businesses; it’s about improving access to education and healthcare as well.
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February 01, 2011
In December 2010, Children’s Hospital Boston achieved HIMSS Stage 7. We had the pleasure of interviewing Daniel Nigrin, MD, MS, Senior VP for Information Services & Chief Information Officer Division of Endocrinology & Informatics Program at Children's Hospital Boston to learn more about Boston Children's success as one of healthcare IT’s early adopters.
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