HHS [U.S. Department of Health &
Human Services] Announces Project to Help 3.6 Million Consumers Reap
Benefits of Electronic Health Records
In a move that will improve health care for millions of
Americans, HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt today announced a five-year
demonstration project that will encourage small to medium-sized physician
practices to adopt electronic health records (EHRs).
“This demonstration is designed to show that
streamlining health care management with electronic health records will
reduce medical errors and improve quality of care for 3.6 million
Americans. By linking higher payment to use of EHRs to meet quality
measures, we will encourage adoption of health information technology at
the community level, where 60 percent of patients receive care,” Secretary
Leavitt said. “We also anticipate that EHRs will produce significant
savings for Medicare over time by improving quality of care. This is
another step in our ongoing effort to become a smart purchaser of health
care -- paying for better, rather than simply paying for more.”
Conducted by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid
Services (CMS), the demonstration would be open to participation by up to
1,200 physician practices beginning in the spring. Over a five-year
period, the program will provide financial incentives to physician groups
using certified EHRs to meet certain clinical quality measures. A bonus
will be provided each year based on a physician group’s score on a
standardized survey that assesses the specific EHR functions a group
employs to support the delivery of care.
The CMS demonstration also will help advance Secretary
Leavitt’s efforts to shift health care in the U.S. toward a system based
on value. The Department is working to effect change through its
Value-Driven Health Care initiative, which is based on Four Cornerstones:
interoperable electronic health records, public reporting of provider
quality information, public reporting of cost information, and incentives
for value comparison.
“Broad adoption of electronic health records has the
potential not only to improve the quality of care provided, but also to
transform the way medicine is practiced and delivered,” said Secretary
Leavitt. “We are looking for 1,200 physician practice pioneers who will
help us move health care toward a system that delivers better quality at
lower cost for more Americans.”
EHRs Revolutionize How Health Data is Managed and
Maintained
Under the CMS demonstration, all participating practices
will be required to use a certified EHR system to perform specific
functions that can positively affect patient care processes, such as
clinical documentation and ordering prescriptions. The system, which must
be in place by the end of the second year, must also be approved by a
certification body officially recognized by HHS. The core incentive
payment to practices will be based on performance on the quality measures,
with an enhanced bonus based on the how well integrated the EHR is in
helping manage patient care.
“We want to revolutionize the way vital health data is
managed and maintained, so we are taking steps to change from a
paper-based medical record to an electronic health record,” said CMS
Acting Administrator Kerry Weems. “This project will appropriately align
incentives to reward doctors in small physician practices who use
certified EHRs as tools to deliver higher quality care. This reward
structure will bring the benefits of electronic health records to
Americans at their most frequent point of contact with health care – their
family doctor.”
During the five-year project, it is estimated that 3.6
million consumers will be directly affected as their primary care
physicians adopt certified EHRs in their practices. In order to amplify
the effect of this demonstration project, CMS is encouraging private
insurers to offer similar incentives for EHR adoption.
“We believe that encouraging higher quality care through
the use of EHRs benefits every health care stakeholder. That is why we are
asking private insurers to help accelerate certified EHR adoption by
offering incentives similar to those in this demonstration,” Acting
Administrator Weems said.
HHS Drives Community-Based Information Sharing
During today’s event, Secretary Leavitt also announced
that HHS has begun the process of chartering Value Exchanges as part of
the Value-Driven Health Care initiative. Through this, HHS will recognize
local organizations that have convened purchasers, health plans,
providers, and consumers to advance value-driven health care.
“Efforts to improve the quality and cost of health care
start with national standards, but end with local control,” Secretary
Leavitt said. “I’m pleased that not only will we see change at the local
level through this demonstration project, but also through the Chartered
Value Exchanges. Through these, we are taking an important step in
providing Americans with the information they need to make better informed
health care decisions -- and encouraging providers to pay even closer
attention to the cost and quality of their services.”
Ultimately, Chartered Value Exchanges will have access
to Medicare physician quality performance measurement results that will be
provided by CMS, likely as soon as the summer of 2008.
The CVE application process is open now through
mid-December, and many local organizations that have already been
recognized as Community Leaders are expected to apply.
Background on Electronic Health Records
In 2004, President Bush recognized the need for the
federal government to promote development of a secure, nationwide,
interoperable health information technology infrastructure that would
improve the quality and efficiency of health care in America. To advance
the initiative, he established at HHS the Office of the National
Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC). Among its many
activities, ONC created a process for certifying health information
systems, an important step in developing the program CMS announced today.
“This project is a major step toward President’s goal of
most Americans having access to a secure, interoperable electronic health
record by 2014,” said Dr. Robert Kolodner, the current National
Coordinator.
In July 2006, the Institute of Medicine estimated that
more than 1.5 million Americans are injured every year by drug errors in
hospitals, nursing homes and doctors’ offices. A 2005 study in the Journal
of the American Medical Association showed that clinical information is
frequently missing at the point of care, and that this missing information
can be harmful to patient. That study also showed that clinical
information was less likely to be missing in practices that had full
electronic records systems.
HHS cited the following potential benefits for patients
and physicians from broad adoption of EHRs:
- Used in conjunction with e-prescribing, EHRs can help
reduce adverse drug events, medical errors, and redundant tests and
procedures by ensuring doctors have access to all their patients’
relevant health history at the place and time care is delivered;
- EHRs can make it easier for physicians to identify
various serious illnesses and prescribe relevant medication or
treatment. EHRs also can ensure the use of preventive services such as
health screenings, which can help reduce health care costs;
- EHRs yield an organized patient treatment history
that makes it easier to find vital health information and prescribe
treatment;
- EHRs can help to improve communication between
patients and providers, giving patients better access to timely
information; and
- EHRs can reduce office wait times by improving office
efficiency.
The Certification Commission for Healthcare Information
Technology (CCHIT) is currently the only certification body recognized by
the Secretary of HHS. More information about certification is available
on the HHS and CCHIT Web sites at
www.hhs.gov/healthit/certification/background/ and
http://www.cchit.org/.
More information about CVEs can be found online at
http://www.hhs.gov/valuedriven/communities/valueexchanges/exchanges.html.
Source:
http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2007pres/10/pr20071030a.html