Meaningful use stages 1 and 2 fall short of implementing the interoperability among electronic health records that is necessary to facilitate information exchange and develop a robust health data infrastructure, according to a new report from a taskforce assembled by the MITRE Corporation, Health Data Management<

Electronic health record satisfaction among primary care physicians has increased over the past six years, according to a report from Black Book Rankings, Clinical Innovation & Technology reports.

As of the end of February, 458,137 eligible hospitals and professionals were participating in the meaningful use program, officials said during a Health IT Policy Committee meeting last week, Government Health IT reports. 

Two thousand primary care surveyed EHR users narrowed down an elite group of systems vendors across eighteen probing key performance indicators from a field of over 400 qualified healthcare software firms. As thousands of primary care practices still scramble to select and implement records systems, current adopters identify the firms that delivered on implementation success, productivity, outcomes, connectivity, meaningful use achievement and crucial stimulus fund requirements.

Please join CMS and health care industry leaders to discuss important eHealth topics:

Topics for the Healthcare User Experience (#HCUX) tweet chat

#HCUX TweetChat for June 26, 2014

The first #HCUX (Healthcare User Experience) chat was hosted by Bennett Lauber (@uuAbility), Chief Experience Officer of The Usability People, LLC
The moderator for this chat has not yet been set.

Topics, so far, are:

Better clinical information system user experience can improve the quality of care. Discuss -

Can someone tell me why no one advertises #design positions in #hit? HIT needs consumer grade #UX

CMS has released updated specifications for electronic clinical quality measures used by eligible hospitals in 2014 under meaningful use Stage 2, as well as a new tool for measure developers, Health Data Managemen

Earlier this week, the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society sent a letter  to CMS Administrator Marilyn Tavenner with recommendations on how the agency can maximize the number of successful attesters to Stage 2 of the meaningful use program this year, FierceEMR reports.

Health IT experts and industry stakeholders are looking to CMS to provide clarity on a newly enacted law that delays the ICD-10 compliance deadline until at least 2015, Modern Healthcare reports (Carlson/Robeznieks, Modern Healthcare, 4/1).

Specialty physicians who are late adopters of electronic health records could face challenges meeting patient portal requirements under Stage 2 of the meaningful use program, according to a study published in the American Journal of Medical Quality, Health

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT launched a Clinical Quality Framework initiative that will work to integrate guidelines for clinical decision support and electronic clinical quality measurement, according to a "Health IT Buzz" blog post by

Quality ratings on CMS' Hospital Compare website lack the data variation needed to adequately help patients distinguish the quality and performance of different providers, according to a study published in the journal Health Services Research,

The HHS Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT have launched a new initiative designed to help spur the use of health IT in emergency medical services, EHR Intelligence reports.
About the Initiative

On Feb. 26, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT released a Notice of Proposed Rule Making to develop a Voluntary 2015 Edition Electronic Health Record Certification Program and update its previous certification criteria and rules.

Preliminary recommendations for stage 3 of the “meaningful use” EHR Incentive Program were released by an Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) workgroup.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services issued guidance for eligible professionals, eligible hospitals and critical access hospitals that are unable to implement the 2014 Edition of Certified Electronic Health Record technology in time to successfully demonstrate meaningful use for the 2014 reporting year.

Visit the EHR Incentive Program webpage (http://www.cms.gov/Regulations-and-Guidance/Legislation/EHRIncentiveProg... ) for the:

HHS should establish performance measures for its meaningful use program that would help the agency "track progress toward program outcomes, such as health care quality, efficiency and patient safety," according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office, Health Data Management reports (Slabodkin, Health Data Management, 3/6).

The majority of studies have found that health IT adoption has enabled care quality improvements, according to a recent literature review conducted by the RAND Corporation for the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT, Clinical Innovation & Technology reports (Pedulli, Clinical Innovation &a

The new ONC 2015 Certification contains a big win for accessibility.

This is great news for the growing number of seniors that use technology. Meaningful Use Certification will require a move up to WCAG 2.0 Level AA .

UPDATE: The final rule has been released. See http://www.theusabilitypeople.com/service/safety-enhanced-design-testing...