Healthcare Providers are Reluctant

Majority of Healthcare Providers Are Reluctant to Maximize the Full Potential of

EHR Meaningful Use

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According to a new survey conducted by Stoltenberg Consulting, a leading healthcare information technology (HIT) consulting firm at the 2014 HIMSS Annual Conference & Exhibition, majority of healthcare providers (70 percent of respondents) don’t feel they have maximized the full potential of meaningful use even though they have met the requirements of the federal EHR Incentive Program. In the opinion of Shane Pilcher, Vice President, Stoltenberg Consulting, most healthcare organizations consider meaningful use as a mere must-do regulatory requirement. The survey shows the frustrations of providers, with 50 percent blaming lack of resources as the major impediment to achieve meaningful use while 23 percent points to tight time frames, 15 percent cites the lack of buy-in from others in their organizations and 12 percent blamed competing health IT projects. In reality, meaningful use does impact quality care and medical billing procedures.

Meaningful Use of EHR – A Brief Overview

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Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs insist on the ‘meaningful use’ of certified EHR technology by providers to receive an EHR incentive payment.

The providers need to show they are meaningfully using their EHR system by meeting certain measurement thresholds ranging from recording patient information to exchanging summary care records. CMS has specified these thresholds for eligible healthcare professionals, hospitals and critical access hospitals (CAHs) which you can find on CMS official website. The incentive programs include three stages for participation. Every provider can begin the participation 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. Once the provider meets Stage 1 requirements, it is required to meet Stage 2 requirements for full two years.

As per Shane Pilcher, meaningful use is much more than a regulatory requirement. The healthcare organizations should consider it as a strategy, discipline and process that facilitates critical healthcare transitions involving full patient engagement, value-based accountable care and population health management.

The

organizations

which

maximize

the

full

potential

of

meaningful use can secure their future with promising developments including mobile health, remote monitoring, medical home, care collaboration and so on.

In this way, EHR has a bigger role in providing quality care.

Major Reasons Why Providers Hesitate to Exploit the Full Potential The survey highlights mainly two reasons for the reluctance of providers in enhancing the potential of meaningful use:

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ICD-10

Implementation

–

As

the

deadline

(October

1,

2014)

for

implementing the new ICD-10 medical coding system is drawing near, most providers are giving more focus to implement the changes associated with ICD10 rather than meaningful use. According to the survey, 47 percent respondents said their chief IT priority in 2014 would be ICD-10 while 27 percent said big data, 16 percent said EHR implementation and 10 percent said meaningful use.

Lack of Knowledge in Managing the Data – Many providers are unsure about how to proceed with the big data that has to be managed after meaningful use. Around 40 percent of respondents in the survey said most providers don’t know what to do with their data. According to Shane Pilcher, it is important for healthcare organizations to differentiate big data from more appropriate smart healthcare data since the collected data usually gets stored somewhere in data warehouses which will be expected to be used in next five years or so eventually. If the organizations fail to monitor what they are saving, they will find that the quality, quantity and type of data do not match with what they need while using the data.

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In the opinion of experts, providers should choose the right EHR vendor, impart meaningful use training and change to the documentation processes that are compatible with the meaningful use guidelines. By partnering with a professional medical billing and coding company that offers EHR feeds, healthcare providers

can

considerably

reduce

the

efforts

taken

to

manage

the

documentation tasks for billing requirements. Such a company can also help with the ICD-10 changeover.

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About Outsource Strategies International Outsource Strategies International (OSI) is a reputable medical outsourcing solutions provider based in Tulsa, Oklahoma offering advanced medical billing and coding solutions for hospitals, physicians, physicians' groups, clinics and other healthcare entities. Find more details at: www.outsourcestrategies.com Contact Us 8596 E. 101st Street, Suite H Tulsa, OK 74133 Main: (800) 670 2809 Fax: (877) 835-5442 E-mail: info@managedoutsource.com URL: www.outsourcestrategies.com