HITPC: CMS reports nearly $17B in total EHR payments

As of October, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has distributed just shy of $17 billion in EHR incentive payments to 329,688 unique eligible professionals (EPs) and hospitals, CMS Health Insurance Specialist Robert Anthony reported to the Health IT Policy Committee on Dec. 4.

Anthony said while the numbers continue to edge upwards, he expects they “will really take off in January and February,” noting a significant uptick during these months in years past.

Also reported:

• Approximately 85 percent of eligible hospitals have received an incentive payment
• More than eight out of ten hospitals have made a financial commitment to an EHR
• About 60 percent of Medicare EPs are meaningful users of EHRs
• About 76 percent of Medicaid EPs have received an incentive payment
• More than 64 percent of Medicare and Medicaid EPs have financially invested in an EHR

Core objective performance for hospitals that have participated in the program for three consecutive years continues to hold steady, he said. In the area of menu objectives, hospitals generally fared well but continued to struggle in the domains of reporting lab results to public health agencies and submission of syndrome surveillance data.

Jennifer King, research and evaluation branch chief of the ONC's Office of Economic Analysis, Evaluation and Modeling, provided data on hospitals’ attestation to Stage 1 MU by 2014 edition certification status of primary vendor.

As of November 13, 89 percent of eligible hospitals that have attested to Stage 1 MU used a primary vendor that had any 2014 edition product, she said.

The size, type and location of the hospitals did not reveal much variation, but smaller and critical access hospitals continued to lag behind in terms of using a 2014 edition product. For example, while 86 percent of large and 85 percent of medium hospitals reported using 2014 edition certified products, the rate was 77 percent for small rural and 75 percent for critical access hospitals.

For EPs, 70 percent that have attested to Stage 1 used a primary vendor that had any 2014 edition product. Primary care physicians (68 percent), surgical specialists (68 percent) and medical specialist (61 percent) were more likely to attest to Stage 1 MU using a 2014 edition product compared to specialists in radiology, pathology and anesthesiology (3 percent), she said.