Legislator presses OIG to extend EHR safe harbor provision

With the EHR safe harbor provision set to expire at the end of 2013, one lawmaker is urging the Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Inspector General (OIG) to take action to renew the arrangement that allows the donation of EHR technology and electronic prescribing under certain instances.

In 2006, CMS and the OIG created the safe harbor to allow groups practices to take advantage of nonmonetary remuneration from hospitals for the purpose of setting up or improving EHR systems. The purpose was to incentivize the meaningful use of EHR systems.

In a March 28 letter to Gregory Demske, Esq., chief counsel to the Department of Health and Human Services Inspector General, Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.) -- Ranking Member of the Ways and Means Health Subcommittee--urged expeditious action to renew the provision. He said Congress is interested in initiatives designed to reduce healthcare costs and eliminate wasteful spending, and a renewal would serve that interest.

“Care coordination certainly represents good medical practice and can decrease healthcare costs by: (a) eliminating the need for duplicative and unnecessary testing, and (b) reducing the potential for medical errors that can occur when clinicians simply do not have all of the medical record history needed to appropriately care for a patient,” he wrote in the letter.

McDermott described the safe harbor as a common-sense policy that encourages collaboration among providers while taking caution to prevent “unscrupulous providers” from donating EHR software in exchange for referrals.

The legislator ended the letter by requesting Demske to include a sunset date in the renewed provision “so you can address newly emerging fraud schemes that might negatively impact the federally-funded programs.”