Dive Brief:
- The submission period to apply for Meaningful Use hardship exemptions has been extended through Nov. 30, according to a recent announcement by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. Originally closed for hospitals on April 1 and other providers on July 1, CMS decided to reopen the process. To date, the department has received 44,000 applications for exemptions.
- Providers are eligible for a hardship exemption if they are unable to implement 2014 editions of electronic medical records because they can't find available technology. Hospitals that do not apply for an exemption but do not attest in time will receive adjustments to their Medicare reimbursements in 2015.
- CMS did not offer a reason for the extension, but it is clear from the number of applications received that providers are having challenges attesting to Stage 2. Medical groups had urged CMS to move the deadline because the final rule wasn't going to be released until after the application period.
Dive Insight:
The hardship extension is helping providers, but it is also working to make up for a glitch in the CMS system that might have unfairly penalized a number of providers. The problem, reported late last month, was not allowing providers to register that they had attested until mid-October, even though the deadline was Oct. 1. CMS said providers had sufficient warning to attest and could have filed for extensions before the original deadline. But those that were unaware of the glitch, mainly those that were filing for the first time this year, were going to lose some of their 2015 Medicare payments.
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