Continuing the process

The Office for the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) keeps plugging away at interoperability and other efforts to set the stage for the future of health IT. This week, the office held its monthly Health IT Policy Committee meeting as well as a joint meeting between the Health IT Standards and Health IT Privacy Committees.

Despite concerns of more burden placed on providers, committee members said the Department of Health and Human Services' (HHS) plan to shift Medicare to value-based payments fits well with the 10-year interoperability roadmap released two weeks ago.

By the end of 2016, HHS expects that 30 percent of Medicare fee-for-service reimbursements will be directed to bundled payments, accountable care organizations and other new models, a threshold that will rise to 50 percent two years later.

“That was very enabling for this [interoperability] work,” Heath IT Policy Committee Vice-Chair Paul Tang, MD, MS, said. “I think 30 percent is past that tipping point where people start behaving differently.”

Tang also heaped praise on ONC for the 166-page roadmap. “This is a tremendous piece of work,” said Tang, who also called the document “a work of art.”

The meeting also included a review of the latest Meaningful Use numbers, with a report that retention rates for hospitals in the program are strong.

Only 3-4 percent of the 4,993 U.S. hospitals have not registered or participated in the MU program, according to Dawn Heisey-Grove, public health analyst at ONC. “The vast majority of eligible hospitals have achieved Meaningful Use or are making progress towards Meaningful Use."

In all, nine out of 10 hospitals achieved MU by fiscal year 2014. Critical access hospitals progressed in the EHR incentive program at roughly the same rate as other hospitals. Children’s hospitals, which started later in the program, have the fewest number of attestations. Small rural hospitals with fewer than 100 beds attested at the same rate as the larger hospitals. However, smaller urban hospitals, many of which are specialty hospitals, had the lowest rates. “That is something we need to look into further," she said.

Retention rates also are high, Heisey-Grove said, noting that providers must complete two years of Stage 1 before progressing to Stage 2.

Has your organization retained its retention in the program? Please share your experience.

Beth Walsh

Clinical Innovation + Technology editor