Critical Access Hospitals (CAH)

See the following -

A Public Health Perspective on the CMS Quality Payment Program

I have seen several pretty good summaries of the recently 0release Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) 2019 Inpatient Prospective Payment System Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to Quality Payment Program (one from AMIA, one from CDC). Here are just a few additional tidbits I picked out of the NPRM. Of course, this document is written like stereo instructions so I welcome any corrections or comments to my interpretation of what’s in the rule. I put page numbers (from final FBO version referenced above which has just been released) where relevant in parenthesis. And I apologize in advance as much of what’s here is cryptic to anyone who has not been exposed to this before and I don’t make much of an attempt to explain the context (or even the acronyms)...

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Critical Access & Small Hospitals Falling Behind in Meaningful Use

Joseph Goedert | HealthData Management | August 6, 2013

A study from Mathematica Policy Research and the American Hospital Association, published in Health Affairs, finds many critical access hospitals and other smaller hospitals are at risk to fail achieving meaningful use and face Medicare payment penalties in 2015. Read More »

HLN Submits Comments to the CMS Quality Payment Program

On June 14, 2018 HLN submitted the following comments on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) 2019 Inpatient Prospective Payment System Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to Quality Payment Program based on our earlier comments...We are quite concerned by both the overall direction and the specific recommendations regarding public health objectives and measures in the NRPM. Regarding the changes to the proposed measures, CMS has not provided any explanation for why Syndromic Surveillance reporting was selected as the required measure. Other public health measures (e.g., Immunization reporting, Electronic Laboratory Reporting, Electronic Case Reporting) continue to require incentives for implementation.

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Hospitals Must Attest To Meaningful Use By November 30

Nicole Freeman | EHR Intelligence | November 22, 2013

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) would like to remind hospitals that the deadline for attestation for the Medicare EHR Incentive Program is November 30. Those who do not attest by that time will not be able to receive a 2013 incentive. Read More »

Latest Data on Medicare & Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs

The latest numbers have been posted on the 'open data' HealthIT.Gov  web site about the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS) Electronic Health Records (EHR) Incentive Program. The 'open data' Health IT Dashboard maintained by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) provides an overview of key performance measures, facts, figures, graphs, maps, and data tables that enable real-time monitoring of the status and impact related to federal health IT programs and the modernization of the U.S. health care system. Read More »

Open source VistA System offers Major Benefits for Small Community & Critical Access Hospitals (CAH)

Almost one fifth of the U.S. population lives in a rural areas. Critical Access Hospitals (CAH) and other small, rural community hospitals provide vital services to over 60 million people living in these areas.Many of these small  rural hospitals cannot afford to acquire and implement costly commercial EHR systems.  There is an alternative - the high quality, low cost 'open source' VistA system supported by a growing number of health IT vendors. Read More »