Medical Billing- Four Steps to Meaningful Use Readiness

EHR implementation is a looming issue for every practice. Along with that comes meaningful use compliance. It is important to make sure you are ready to report on meaningful use as it relates to your practice. This is so you can easily apply for the monetary incentives that come with implementing a certified EHR system.

Four steps for ensuring meaningful use readiness are:

• Understand exactly what the meaningful use criteria are for your practice. You can fine the core menu and objectives on detailed PDFs at https://www.cms.gov/EHRIncentivePrograms/Downloads/EP-MU-TOC.pdf.>

For most practices, around 20 criteria will be necessary for reporting purposes. However, these will be reported on in varying degrees. For example, some items will need to be functionally enabled (such as Exchanging Critical Information) or performed just once (Security Risk Analysis). Some will become part of your daily practice (like Demographics). Depending on your practice some items might not need to be reported at all. For example, ophthalmologists do not routinely check vital signs so they would report a zero for that criteria.

• Know if your EHR provider is temporarily certified under the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC). You can browse a list or search for these providers at http://onc-chpl.force.com/ehrcert. This is called the Certified Health IT Product List (CHPL). There are over 800 EHR providers and modules for ambulatory and in-patient service practices.

• Be aware of the impact of EHR system implementation on your office workflow and procedures. A good example of this is the collection of data requirements. You need to make sure the appropriate coding and language, the required data entry fields and the point in the process the information is collected complies with the meaningful use reporting criteria.

• Prepare for the reporting process. For example, for the first year, you are only required to attest to the fact that meaningful use requirements are being met. The word attestation means that your practice is collecting the data in some manner, even if you are doing so on an excel spreadsheet.

The attestation process was officially kicked off on 4-18-11. However, in 2012, the data you collect will have to actually be submitted to CMS (Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services). Unfortunately, the webinars and publications about the details of this process have not been always been as clear as they could be.

Still, you have to keep checking the CMS website and other medical resources for updates on this critical part of your practice.