A 'Meaningful' User of an Electronic Health Record System Describes Its Clinical and Financial Benefits
Author(s): Sarah Klein The Commonwealth Fund, 2011
In May, the federal government awarded its first payments to physicians who successfully demonstrated that they are making meaningful use of electronic health record systems (EHR). To qualify for the payments, physicians had to prove that—among other things—their EHR systems were capable of capturing and exchanging health information on patients, including lists of medications, allergies, and test results. Physicians were also required to demonstrate that the EHR had the functionality for computerized physician order entry, electronic prescribing, and reporting of clinical quality measures to state and federal bodies.
Two weeks after the government began allowing physicians and other providers to certify that they had such systems in place, 283 providers had qualified for the first payment of $18,000 (another 37 hospitals and/or health systems qualified for larger payments.) Over the next five years, those who meet additional and increasingly rigorous requirements will be eligible to receive a total of up to $63,750. To create an additional incentive to adopt an EHR, the government will begin penalizing those physicians who forgo EHRs with a 1 percent reduction in Medicare fees beginning in 2015. The penalties increase each year until they reach 5 percent.
The federal government hopes the financial incentives, the threat of penalties, and the regional training it is offering providers to facilitate the implementation of EHRs will encourage the participation of the nearly 50 percent of U.S. physicians who do not now use any form of an EHR.
To understand the obstacles these physicians may face in implementing an EHR that meets the government's meaningful use standard and how these systems enhance quality of care, Quality Matters asked Jen Brull, M.D., one of the very first physicians in the country to be certified as a meaningful user of an EHR, to describe her experience incorporating one into her medical practice.
