EHNAC finalizes PMS accreditation criteria

The Electronic Healthcare Network Accreditation Commission (EHNAC) has adopted final criteria for its Practice Management System Accreditation Program (PMSAP).

The non-profit standards development organization and accrediting body for organizations that electronically exchange healthcare data, incorporated feedback received during the 60-day public review and finalized and adopted the criteria for the program.

Jointly developed with the Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange (WEDI), the program was initially announced in February 2014 and launched in July 2014 with the goal of delivering a new standard to the practice management system (PMS) community and a source of confidence within providers in their respective PMS partners. The first two organizations, which participated as betas for the program, were fully accredited in January 2015.

The accreditation program offers a comprehensive evaluation of PMS vendors in the areas of privacy, security, mandated standards and operating rules, and key operational functions. Additionally, the PMSAP assesses health information and oversight for meeting privacy and security, HIPAA and ACA requirements, as well as focuses on technical performance, business processes and resource management. Additionally, the program provides a review of the PMS vendor readiness to support and implement ICD-10 in 2015 and therefore a level of assurance to the provider community.

In addition to WEDI and EHNAC, the PMSAP advisory committee that has been working on developing and refining the draft criteria of the program includes executive representatives from AdvancedMD, the American Association of Professional Coders, GE Healthcare, Healthpac Computer Systems, the Healthcare Administrative Technology Association, the Medical Group Management Association, Medinformatix, NextGen Healthcare and more including other major national provider associations.