As of 10/8/2015, CMS has passed a rule that changes the measures of Meaningful Use for 2015. Please refer to this webinar, hosted by Collaborative Practice Solutions, for the most recent information on meaningful use. For the written guide to the Stage 2 Revision, please click here: Stage 2 Revision. For more information on the Medicare reimbursement program for 2017 and onward, see MIPS. The below information is ARCHIVED.
Meaningful Use Stage 1 Definition
CMS defines Meaningful Use as follows:
The Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs provide financial incentives for the meaningful use of certified EHR technology to improve patient care. To receive an EHR incentive payment, providers have to show that they are meaningfully using their EHRs by meeting thresholds for a number of objectives. The EHR Incentive Programs are phased in three stages with increasing requirements.
Eligible professionals participate in the program on the calendar year, while eligible hospitals and CAHs participate according to the federal fiscal year.
Providers must attest to demonstrating meaningful use every year to receive an incentive and avoid a Medicare payment adjustment.
Meaningful Use Stage 1 Breakdown
| Eligible Professional Core Objectives |
|---|
| (1) Use CPOE for medication orders directly entered by any licensed healthcare professional who can enter orders into the medical record per state, local and professional guidelines. |
| (2) Implement drug-drug and drug-allergy interaction checks. |
| (3) Maintain an up-to-date problem list of current and active diagnoses. |
| (4) Generate and transmit permissible prescriptions electronically (eRx). |
| (5) Maintain active medication list. |
| (6) Maintain active medication allergy list. |
| (7) Record all of the following demographics: (A) Preferred language (B) Gender (C) Race (D) Ethnicity (E) Date of birth. |
| (8) Record and chart changes in the following vital signs: (A) Height (B) Weight (C) Blood pressure (D) Calculate and display body mass index (BMI) (E) Plot and display growth charts for children 0–20 years, including BMI. |
| (9) Record smoking status for patients 13 years old or older. |
| (10) Implement one clinical decision support rule relevant to specialty or high clinical priority along with the ability to track compliance with that rule. |
| (11) Provide patients the ability to view online, download, and transmit information within four business days of the information being available to the EP. |
| (12) Provide clinical summaries for patients for each office visit. |
| (13) Protect electronic health information created or maintained by the certified EHR technology through the implementation of appropriate technical capabilities. |
| Eligible Professional Menu Objectives |
| (1) Implement drug formulary checks. |
| (2) Incorporate clinical lab-test results into EHR as structured data. |
| (3) Generate lists of patients by specific conditions to use for quality improvement, reduction of disparities, research, or outreach. |
| (4) Send patient reminders per patient preference for preventive/follow-up care. |
| (5) Use certified EHR technology to identify patient-specific education resources and provide those resources to the patient if appropriate. |
| (6) The EP who receives a patient from another setting of care or provider of care or believes an encounter is relevant should perform medication reconciliation. |
| (7) The EP who transitions their patient to another setting of care or provider of care or refers their patient to another provider of care should provide summary care record for each transition of care or referral. |
| (8) Capability to submit electronic data to immunization registries or immunization information systems and actual submission according to applicable law and practice. |
| (9) Capability to submit electronic syndromic surveillance data to public health agencies and actual submission according to applicable law and practice. |
Completing Meaningful Use
To successfully complete Meaningful Use, you must:
1. Exceed the percentage threshold for each individual measure. For example, if the required percentage is 50%, you must have at least 51%.
2. For Stage 1, you must complete all 13 Core Objectives. You must select 5 of the available 9 Menu Objectives.
For Menu Objectives, TRAKnet recommends: 1, 3, 5, 6, 7; however, these are entirely up to the discretion of the practice.
Meaningful Use Report
The Meaningful Use report can be found in TRAKnet under the Reports menu at the top of the screen, then Meaningful Use. There are three different reports: a Stage 1 report, a Stage 2 report, and a detailed report of both, which shows each individual encounter or patient that makes up the denominator for that measure.