Practice Point: Alert! July and October 2014 Are Key to Reporting Requirements Timeline

In my recent Practice Points columns, we have discussed “Clinical Quality Measures and Meaningful Use” (May 2014) and “Quality Measures and Physician Quality Reporting System” (June 2014). Within each column, we discussed the importance of each program and how it truly benefits you. I have received a number of questions related to each program-specifically, the intentions and timelines. Although both programs provide incentives through their respective methods of quality reporting, I wanted to ensure a clear understanding of Meaningful Use and Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS) opportunities and important timelines for each program.

Meaningful Use Attestation Through the Certified Electronic Health Record

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS) Electronic Health Record (EHR) Incentive Program provides financial incentives for the “meaningful use” of certified EHR technology. Attestation is the part of the process to secure CMS EHR Incentive Program reimbursements that requires providers to prove (attest to) that they are meaningfully using a certified EHR.

To receive an EHR incentive payment, providers have to show that they are “meaningfully using” their certified EHR technology by meeting certain measurement thresholds that range from recording patient information as structured data to exchanging summary care records. The CMS has established these thresholds for eligible professionals (EPs), eligible hospitals, and critical access hospitals (CAHs).

The CMS EHR Incentive Programs include 3 stages with increasing requirements for participation. All providers begin participating by meeting the Stage 1 requirements for a 90-day period in their first year of meaningful use and a full year in their second year of meaningful use. After meeting the Stage 1 requirements, providers will then have to meet Stage 2 requirements for 2 full years. Eligible professionals participate in the program on the calendar years, whereas eligible hospitals and CAHs participate according to the federal fiscal year…

Read the rest of the article at Advances in Skin & Wound Care.

An excerpt from an article originally published in Advances in Skin & Wound Care, written by Cathy Thomas Hess, BSN, RN, CWOCN, VP and Chief Clinical Officer at Net Health