HITPC: Modest growth in EPs and EHs attesting to MU Stage 2
As of the end of May, 447 eligible professionals (EPs) and eight eligible hospitals (EHs) have attested to Meaningful Use (MU) Stage 2, Elisabeth Myers, policy and outreach lead at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), told the Health IT Policy Committee during its virtual meeting on June 10.
These entities represent a portion of the total 1,497 EPs and 75 EHs that have attested so far during the 2014 reporting year, she said. Of these, 231 EPs and 21 EHs are new participants in the program.
According to a preliminary analysis, those who have achieved MU Stage 2 are largely individual providers that often are not associated with hospitals—and these EPs are more likely to use cloud-based software than their counterparts, she said.
Commenting on the low number of hospitals, she said the agency’s primary concern is not so much over Stage 2 MU but the functionality of certified EHR technology (CERHT). “This is the primary cause of barriers to attestation, which is driving the proposed rule,” she said, referring to a recent proposal by CMS and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT to give entities more flexibility in how they use CEHRT to meet MU requirements. However, she added that one major indicator of success in attesting to MU Stage 2 is implementation of software that can be used for both MU Stage 1 and 2.
So far it is too early to say whether Stage 2 is successful, Myers said. The agency has convened a team to reach out to those who have successfully attested to MU Stage 2 for lessons learned and to better identify their characteristics. More on that analysis will be forthcoming, she said.
In all, CMS has dispersed a total of $24 billion in EHR incentive payments as of the end of May. Some of the latest numbers reported at the meeting:
- More than 91 percent of EHs have received an EHR incentive payment
- More than 380,000 Medicare and Medicaid EPs have received an EHR incentive payment
- 88 percent of EPs have registered for the Medicare or Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs
- 68 percent of Medicare and Medicaid EPs have made a financial commitment to implementing an EHR