Paper Sample on Meaningful Use Certified EHR Technology System and Its Implication

Introduction

In the United States, the healthcare system requires all medical practitioners and hospitals to implement electronic health records (EHRs) for their operations. The significance of integrating health information technology (HIT) was emphasized in a case involving the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics concerning the Meaningful Use of HIT (Conte et al., 2019). HIT usage is required to encompass interoperability that promotes clinical measures and decisions relating to quality. The implementation of MU approved EHR reveals significant challenges facing healthcare facilities and practitioners, whether the implications have effects on the healthcare system, or there are no significant impacts for failure to implement.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

Meaningful Use Overview

The US government established the Meaningful Use (MU) program as an element of the 2009 Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act, which focused on inducing healthcare practitioners to illustrate meaningful use of their approved systems of EHR (Everson et al., 2020). Eligible healthcare practitioners offering meaningful use were subject to incentive payments from the program. MU program aims at encouraging a widespread EHR system adoption to facilitate the health system to develop a framework for enhancing efficiency, quality, and safety of healthcare organizations and medical practitioners (Balestra, 2017). Certified healthcare providers are required to implement certified EHR systems and utilize them meaningfully through attaining the obligations developed for enhancing healthcare. The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) developed these requirements to improve the HIT in the countrywide healthcare structure. Individual nurses, physicians among other healthcare practitioners, are subject to gain $63,750 to $44,000 under the Medicaid or Medicare MU programs correspondingly, relating to whether they adhere to the program requirements (Holmgren et al., 2018).

The HITECH Act stipulates that eligible healthcare practitioners who do not show certified EHRs’ meaningful use will receive below 100 percent of their entitled fee schedule of Medicare. These penalties were introduced in 2015 (Conte et al., 2019). The MU program comprises of three main components. First, it entails the implementation of certified EHR technology on promoting electronic health information exchange focused on improving the provision of healthcare. Second, it entails the adoption of approved EHR systems on submitting healthcare quality, among other vital measures. Third, the MU program requires the implementation of EHR systems to be in an effective way, including e-prescribing (Everson et al., 2020). The MU program implementation occurred in three phases. The first phase occurred in 2011 and 2012. The phase demanded all healthcare providers should meet the defined objectives and make sure that not less than 80% of their patients are provided with medical records integrated into the certified system of EHR. The MU also mandated a reporting period of three months and one year afterward. The second phase commenced in 2013 and involved improved clinical processes develop to advance the first stage. The stage purposed on quality enhancement in delivering healthcare. The last and the third phase commenced in 2015. The phase focused on advanced outcomes, including efficiency, safety, and quality of tools of patient self-engagement and healthcare decision support (Holmgren et al., 2018).

Meaningful Use Program Analysis

MU program required eligible providers to meet 13 main objectives and five menu goals in the initial phase. Besides, MU programs required critical access hospitals (CAHs) and entitled healthcare providers to meet 11 primary objectives and five listed goals. In the subsequent stage commencing in 2013, CMS introduced further demands for eligible nurses and CAHs for facilitating them to benefit and engage in the Medicaid and Medicare EHRs (Conte et al., 2019). The MU program provisions demand that eligible healthcare practitioners should satisfy phase one prior to taking on phase two. This requirement is quite critical to make sure that the implementation is consistent and uniform with practices that promote the MU program’s positive impact. Some of the CMS specifications introduced encompassed evaluating the thresholds of numerators and denominators, exclusion criteria, and certification of information (Everson et al., 2020). These specifications match with each objective. A clear objective and specification statement is vital under the MU program as it enables eligible healthcare practitioners to be guided by the clear objectives stated in the program.

The policy significance of the MU program underscores on quality, efficiency, and safety of healthcare services to ensure a reduction in healthcare gaps stemming from economic, geographical, social, and ethnic attributes (Conte et al., 2019). This involves the application of medication orders certified by licensed healthcare practitioners. Additionally, healthcare practitioners are required to implement drug-drug interactions and allergy interaction checks. These policies purpose to eradicate medication errors in the practice of healthcare. Monitoring the drug-drug interaction of patients and their permissible prescriptions need the adoption of approved EHRs. A nurse is expected to record the patient’s personal information in the process to enable effective future healthcare services (Holmgren et al., 2018).

According to the MU program, a patient’s personal information must entail an enlist of existing medical problems, critical signs such as blood pressure, height, BMI, and weight, and patient’s active diagnosis. These measures are critical since they promote the tracking of patient’s compliance with medication prescriptions and clinical decision-making (Everson et al., 2020). Nonetheless, healthcare practitioners are required to ensure that they engage patients and their acquaintances in the processes. Similarly, healthcare practitioners must offer clients with an electronic copy relating to their medical information describing current problems, medication allergies, diagnostic test, and summaries of discharge (Holmgren et al., 2018). Providing patients with medication is critical to promote and improve their healthcare coordination. Healthcare practitioners are required to ensure maximum privacy and security of patients’ personal information acquired during care sessions (Balestra, 2017).

Recommendations on the Meaningful Use Certified EHR Technology

The importance of MU in providing quality and coordinated healthcare in the healthcare system has been highlighted in many studies. Regardless of the many MU challenges and continued support, multiple pertinent barriers still prevail (Balestra, 2017). For instance, the first phase of the MU program demands that increased resources and advanced technologies to promote the achievement of improvements required in the subsequent phases. This is very challenging, considering the existing management crisis in the healthcare profession. For effective implementation of EHR systems, it is recommended that healthcare providers hire implementation specialists to enlighten nurses on the measures outlined in the implementation phases (Conte et al., 2019).

Additionally, many workers at the departmental level are not tech-acquainted to allow them to effectively adopt HIT technology and hence raising the need for extensive staff training to promote proper comprehension of EHR systems (Everson et al., 2020). This recommendation is critical, specifically in the second phase of implementation, where the measures need the use of advanced technology. Consequently, two inherent issues established through evidence-based practice are operational and financial. Based on operations, resources are inadequate due to declined technical professionalism and managerial crisis in healthcare facilities (Holmgren et al., 2018). Similarly, insufficient funding to acquire critical elements significant in satisfying requirements is a major problem. These issues contribute to increased non-adherence cases, reduced ability to promote clinical decision-making advancements, declined interoperability, and restrained reporting by health practitioners (Conte et al., 2019).

Conclusion

MU of certified EHR technology is essential in renovating the healthcare system into an efficient, safe, and high-quality system. Healthcare professionals are pertinent elements in the implementation of MU processes and hence their need to engage the entire process. Relating to the overview and analysis of the MU, it is quite expressive that it improves efficiency, promotes safety, and enhances the quality of healthcare of eligible healthcare facilities and practitioners. During the process, the costs of healthcare reduce greatly while allowing healthcare professionals to engage in incentive programs of EHR.

References

Balestra, M. L. (2017). Electronic health records: patient care and ethical and legal implications for nurse practitioners. The Journal for Nurse Practitioners, 13(2), 105-111. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nurpra.2016.09.010

Conte, J. G., Chen, A., Cahill, T., Zhang, N. J., Battaglia, F., & Ong, K. R. (2019). Measuring the impact of certified electronic health record technology on cost, quality, and safety outcomes. International Journal of Computational Medicine and Healthcare, 1(1), 88-100. https://doi.org/10.1504/ijcmh.2019.104366

Everson, J., Rubin, J. C., & Friedman, C. P. (2020). Reconsidering hospital EHR adoption at the dawn of HITECH: implications of the reported 9% adoption of a “basic” EHR. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association. https://doi.org/10.1093/jamia/ocaa090

Holmgren, A. J., Adler-Milstein, J., & McCullough, J. (2018). Are all certified EHRs created equal? Assessing the relationship between EHR vendor and hospital meaningful use performance. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, 25(6), 654-660. https://doi.org/10.1093/jamia/ocx135