Electronic Health Records (EHRs) have been phased into practice
in many major metropolitan hospitals, due in large part to support from the
Obama administration, but this technology may be harder to find in rural
communities. In an attempt to rectify that, the
U.S. government is funneling as much as $30 million through its Regional
Extension Center (REC) program.
The money is part of an effort to get 1,000 federally designated "critical
access hospitals" and small, rural hospitals to adopt electronic health
records (EHRs) and achieve Meaningful Use by 2014. These funds could help up to
1,501 rural hospitals.
This money is in addition to the $32 million in
funding that the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information
Technology (ONC) previously committed to RECs to help health IT adoption at
Critical Access Hospitals. Critical Access Hospitals are defined as rural
facilities with no more than 25 beds and an average daily census of 10 or fewer
patients. The ONC officials said that about 1,220 Critical Access Hospitals and
other small acute care facilities have signed up for REC assistance.
The Kansas City, Mo.-based National Rural Health Association (NRHA), which represents this class of
hospitals, is on board with the plan but still sees obstacles ahead.
"Generally, NRHA is very pleased to see ONC making this push. We think
it's been overdue," said Brock Slabach, NRHA senior VP for member services.
However, Slabach says he will be reserving judgment until he sees ONC's
baseline tally for small hospitals that have already met Meaningful Use. ONC
will allow NRHA to work with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
(CMS)--the "keeper of the data," according to Slabach--to calculate
the baseline.
The short timeline to get to Meaningful Use
before penalties begin Oct. 1, 2014--the start of federal fiscal year 2015,
which Medicare Part A follows--means that hospitals need to get started on EHR
implementation in the next year or so.
Find the full article from InformationWeek’s Health Care section here.
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