Dive Brief:
- CMS and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT have partnered in issuing a joint Request for Information (RFI) called Certification Frequency and Requirements for the Reporting of Quality Measures under CMS Programs.
- The RFI will allow the agencies to assess the effectiveness and difficulty of the agencies' policies around the certification and testing of health IT, particularly EHR products, used to report quality measures.
- The agencies say they aim to streamline and reduce the burdens on providers, hospitals, and health IT developers.
Dive Insight:
The agencies are asking for feedback on how often they should require recertification, how many clinical quality measures to which a certified Health IT Module should be certified, and how to improve testing. The responses will be factored into considerations of upcoming policies around the use of health IT to report quality measures.
"We are working diligently to improve the means for information exchange and electronic data sharing across and among providers and health systems, increase opportunities for stakeholders to provide feedback, and enhance mechanisms for the capturing of clinical information in EHRs, registries, and other systems to assist with quality reporting and care coordination," wrote Kate Goodrich, MD, MHS, director of the Center for Clinical Standards & Quality at CMS.
The comment period will end at 5 p.m. on Feb. 1.