Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS)
The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has created an official website to provide up-to-date, detailed information abou the Electronic Health Record (EHR) incentive programs. The site can be found at http://www.cms.gov/ehrincentiveprograms
The nation's healthcare system is undergoing a transformation in an effort to improve quality, safety and efficiency of care, from the upgrade to ICD-10 to information exchanges of EHR technology. To help facilitate this vision, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act, or the "HITECH Act" established programs under Medicare and Medicaid to provide incentive payments for the "meaningful use" of certified EHR technology. The Medicare and Medicaid EHR incentive programs will provide incentive payments to eligible professionals and eligible hospitals as they adopt, implement, upgrade or demonstrate meaningful use of certified EHR technology. The programs begin in 2011. These incentive programs are designed to support providers in this period of Health IT transition and instill the use of EHRs in meaningful ways to help our nation to improve the quality, safety and efficiency of patient health care.
Establishing the New Program
CMS is establishing the EHR Incentive program through formal rule making. A proposed rule on the EHR incentive programs (and the definition of meaningful use) was published, and CMS accepted public comments for 60 days, which ended on March 15, 2010. More than 2,000 comments were received. CMS is currently working to develop and release the final rule in late spring/early summer 2010. This rule will provide many of the parameters and requirements for the Medicare & Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs. A copy of the proposed rule and related documents is accessible below in the Downloads and Links Inside CMS sections.
CMS' Role in Other HITECH Areas
CMS is also working with the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) in developing standards, implementation specifications, and certification criteria for EHR technology. More information on certification can be found in the tab on the left.
Patient privacy and security is an important consideration in implementing the EHR incentive programs. CMS is also working with the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) and ONC to address the privacy and security protections under HITECH Act. More information on privacy and security related to the Health IT is available by clicking "Health IT/Privacy and Security" and "HHS Office for Civil Rights" in the Related Links Outside CMS section below.
