Meaningful Use Now Defined

The Meaningful Use Rule was released on July 13, 2010. Overall, the perception of healthcare professionals is that their concerns have been listened to and the opportunity for flexibility in meeting the objectives is now a realistic option. 

Since then, several new legislative bills regarding the HITECH Act and the incentives program have recently been introduced.

• HR 6072 – Introduced by Rep. Zack Space (D-Ohio) on 7/30/2010. The bill, known as the Electronic Health Record Incentives for Multi-Campus Hospitals Act, would amend a provision of the recently released rule on “meaningful use” of electronic health records to ensure that hospitals that are part of a larger, multi-campus system and share a single Medicare provider number are eligible for incentive payments, (AHA News [1], 7/30).
• HR 6005 - Introduced by Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Texas) on 7/30/2010. This bill seeks to ease the Incentive qualifications for Early Adopters. The bill, would help make health care providers eligible for Medicare and Medicaid incentive payments in 2011 and 2012 if their existing EHR systems comply with meaningful use requirements but are not certified (AHA News).
• HR 5040 – Introduced by Reps. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) and Tim Murphy (R-Pa.) April, 2010. This bill known as the Health Information Technology Extension for Behavioral Health Services ACT of 2010, seeks to extend incentive payments included in the HITECH Act to the mental and behavioral health community.

Wide River Technology Extension Center hosted a Meaningful Use webinar on July 23, 2010. The presentation is now able to view; click here to download the video or to view the handouts click here. 

Wide River TEC will be following this legislation and will update this information as it becomes available. To read more, visit HIT Meaningful Use.