Meaningful Use final rule: 4 Tips for hospitals

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) recently unveiled modifications for the second stage and final rules for the third stage of the EHR incentive program.

Related:Meaningful use final rules: 3 things you need to know

As providers and healthcare systems work to digest the rules, here are a few key things to add to your meaningful use to-do list:

1. Update your meaningful use plan and integrate it into your broader strategic plan.

Alignment and prioritization of strategies into an organization’s strategic plan is critical to success of meaningful use objectives and timing.  Your meaningful use plan should include objectives, timelines, and internal and external accountabilities to drive departmental and organizational-wide improvement in functions and processes, as well as physician engagement. 

It should also include:

• Measures of tangible and quantifiable success and targets beyond merely achieving meaningful use to help to clarify the vision (objectives for use of electronic health record (EHR)-generated information, rank order of priorities of objectives);

• A commitment to assess progress and failures. Failure to achieve a target should trigger reexamination of its causes-was implementation too slow? Incomplete? Was the action successful, yet failed to generate desired outcome?

2. Check in with your EHR vendor. Stage 2 compliance is more difficult to achieve. Is your organization’s vendor capable of assisting with achievement of Stage 2? If not, you should consider switching vendors, perhaps to a cloud-based organization rather than a traditional EHR that may be more nimble and comprehensive than your existing vendor.

3. Increase physician engagement. Physician engagement is also critical to success of meaningful use objectives and timing. Physicians must be involved in the development and implementation of the meaningful use business or strategic plan. 

 

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