Dive Brief:
- A coalition of 35 medical groups led by the American Medical Association sent a letter to National Coordinator Karen DeSalvo calling for major changes to the meaningful use program.
- The coalition believes that meaningful use goals may actually harm patients, or have a "downstream effect on public safety."
- The letter outlines several proposed changes, including an increase in EHR implementation education and greater transparency regarding testing and design of EHR systems.
Dive Insight:
The 35-group coalition asserts in the letter that "physician informaticists and vendors have reported to us that meaningful use certification has become the priority in health IT design at the expense of meeting physician customers' needs, patient safety and product innovation."
This isn't the only call for big changes in the meaningful use program, and certainly not the first by the AMA. In December, CMS announced that it was prepared to put 257,000 providers eligible for the Medicare EHR Incentive Program on notice that they had one last chance to demonstrate Meaningful Use face reductions. AMA president-elect Steven J. Sack, MD issued a statement expressing his organization's disapproval of the penalties:
"The American Medical Association is appalled by news from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services that more than 50% of eligible professionals will face penalties under the Meaningful Use program in 2015, a number that is even worse than we anticipated," said the statement.
Want to read more? You may want to read this story about the recent American College of Physicians criticism of the EHR industry.