A Focus on Standards 

Screen Shot 2019-07-04 at 6.19.08 PMOn June 3, EHRA submitted feedback to ONC on its proposed rule, the  21st Century Cures Act: Interoperability, Information Blocking, and the ONC Health IT Certification Program. In this feedback, EHRA members drew on both their expertise as software developers and as contributors to standards work across the health IT industry. 

One theme of EHRA and other stakeholders’ feedback is that a focus on standards is critical. A particular standard proposed recently by ONC is the United States Core Data for Interoperability, or USCDI. USCDI “is a standardized set of health data classes and constituent data elements for nationwide, interoperable health information exchange” and includes important health data classes. 

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by EHRA on July 9, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Health IT Regulation, Interoperability, Public Policy and Health IT
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Posted by EHRA on July 9, 2019

https://ehrablog.org/2019/07/09/a-focus-on-standards/

EHR Developers are Aligned with Goals of Cures NPRM, Hope ONC will Remove Ambiguity and Reassess Timeline

Screen Shot 2019-05-26 at 9.15.33 PMWe had been waiting for the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT to release the proposed rule fulfilling its Cures Act obligation for quite a while. Encompassing important issues like expanded interoperability, defining what is and isn’t information blocking, as well as proposing updated certification requirements, this is an important rule to get right.

Since the release, there have been lots of discussions—public and private, online and off—about intended and potentially unintended impacts of the language in the proposal. With so much to consider and analyze, we appreciate that the request from EHRA and other groups to give us a full three months to draft our comments on the rule was approved.

The tremendously broad reach of the proposed rule goes far beyond Congressional intent.

The EHR Association’s comments are now going through final rounds of review by our executive committee (and the seven workgroups and task forces that contributed their expertise). We worked throughout the drafting of the 21st Century Cures Act with Congress and are supportive of its goal to remove obstacles to information exchange, but we have found that the tremendously broad reach of the proposed rule goes far beyond Congressional intent. In particular, we have significant concerns regarding timelines, ambiguous language, disincentives for innovation, and definitions related to information blocking.

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by EHRA on May 28, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Health IT Regulation, Health IT Standards, Innovation, Interoperability, Public Policy and Health IT

Posted by EHRA on May 28, 2019

https://ehrablog.org/2019/05/28/ehr-developers-are-aligned-with-goals-of-cures-nprm-hope-onc-will-remove-ambiguity-and-reassess-timeline/

An EHR Perspective on the Consumer-Focused API/App Landscape

By Hans Buitendijk
EHRA Executive Committee member
Chair, Interoperability & Standards Workgroup

kevin-grieve-712217-unsplashONC’s 2015 Certification Edition for EHRs began supporting consumer access to their health data beyond patient portals. Open APIs were required to enable consumer Apps to access data from the Common Clinical Data Set. Because at the time there were no standards sufficiently mature to establish as a base, the requirement allowed for access by any means as long as the technical specifications, including terms and conditions, were made publicly available to enable App developers to write their Apps on top of these APIs.

A lot has happened since then.
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by EHRA on March 12, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Certification, Health IT Standards, Interoperability

Posted by EHRA on March 12, 2019

https://ehrablog.org/2019/03/12/an-ehr-perspective-on-the-consumer-focused-api-app-landscape/

MACRA: Then and Now

By David Heller

MACRA

How much do you know about Congress’ effort to “rein in” expenses associated with healthcare’s fee-for-service system with the passage of MACRA?

Incentivizing value-based care was the goal of the Medicare and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015, aka MACRA, writes David Heller of the EHRA Public Policy Committee and Corporate Counsel for Regulatory Affairs at Greenway in an article tracing MACRA’s policy roots and offering recommendations for its future in the American University Health Law and Policy Brief.

In the article, “MACRA: Emerging from the Thicket,” Heller explains some of the reporting complexities that the Congressional authors of MACRA were trying to address.

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by EHRA on February 27, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Delivery System Reform, Public Policy and Health IT

Posted by EHRA on February 27, 2019

https://ehrablog.org/2019/02/27/macra-then-and-now/

Standardizing Data Collection to Support Clinicians in the Opioid Fight

By David Bucciferro and Katelyn Fontaine
EHRA Opioid Crisis Task Force 

Dataset Infographic

Click here to open image in new window.

Volunteers on EHRA’s Opioid Crisis Task Force have made great strides in the past year in our efforts to identify the policy changes and adoption patterns needed to maximize the capacities of health IT to combat the opioid crisis.

From the start, our focus has been, What do providers need from technology to support their efforts in the opioid crisis?

When we began our work in early 2018, we were surprised to find that there was no comprehensive source for the state-specific policies and standards surrounding prescription drug monitoring programs (PDMPs) and electronic prescribing of controlled substances (EPCS). So, we set out to create our own.

State by state, we collected data, including timeframes for reporting controlled substance prescriptions to PDMPs, what data is collected, which professionals are able to access PDMP information, if and when information can be shared across states, and any limits on retaining PDMP data within an EHR.

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by EHRA on February 20, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Interoperability, Opioid Crisis, Public Policy and Health IT, Usability and Clinician Experience

Posted by EHRA on February 20, 2019

https://ehrablog.org/2019/02/20/standardizing-data-collection-to-support-clinicians-in-the-opioid-fight/

How EHR Technology Can Support Best Practices for Opioid Prescribing

By Dan Seltzer and Alan Staples
Co-chairs, Clinician Impact Subgroup, EHRA Opioid Crisis Task Force

screenshot_2018-12-26 ehra cdc opioid guideline implementation guide for ehrs - ehra-cdc-opioid-guideline-implementation-gu[...]The widespread opioid epidemic and its devastating effects flood our news feeds daily. No one is immune, which is why when the Electronic Health Record Association (EHRA) asked for volunteers to join a new Opioid Crisis Task Force, we and many others – including doctors, nurses, and pharmacists – stepped forward to share our experiences and expertise. For the past year, we have been conducting research and providing recommendations on new ways EHR technology can contribute solutions to help solve the complex puzzle of the opioid crisis.

Our most recent contribution is the CDC Opioid Guideline – Implementation Guide for Electronic Health Records.

Initial research and conversations with providers focused on the question, What do providers need from technology to support their efforts in the opioid crisis?  The input we received led us to develop a guide to assist healthcare organizations implement clinical practice guidelines within the EHR to improve opioid stewardship in clinical practice.   Read the full post »

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by EHRA on January 9, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Opioid Crisis, Patient Safety and Health IT, Usability and Clinician Experience, Value of HIT

Posted by EHRA on January 9, 2019

https://ehrablog.org/2019/01/09/how-ehr-technology-can-support-best-practices-for-opioid-prescribing/

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