Meaningful Use Deadline Could Slip

A federal advisory committee work group recommends giving some health-care providers more time to meet the second level of "meaningful use" requirements for their electronic health records, Modern Healthcare.com reports today.

The recommendation is contained in a draft letter from the meaningful-use work group of the Health Information Technology Policy Committee to Farzad Mostashari, the national coordinator for health information technology and chairman of the Health IT Policy Committee.

Citing "careful consideration of the trade-offs between the urgency with which new functionality is needed and the ability to safely deliver and to effectively use the new functionality," the draft letter recommends that providers meeting Stage 1 meaningful use standards in 2011 be given until 2014 to meet Stage 2 standards. The current deadline is 2013. Millions of dollars in federal incentives are at stake.

Final rules for Stage 2 are expected to be released in June 2012, according to the 12-page letter, obtained by Modern Healthcare. EHR vendors then would have to upgrade their systems and hospitals would have to implement the upgrades by October 2012.

"We understand that despite this relatively short delay for a limited number of participants, the meaningful use requirements for stage 2 need to be robust enough to maintain progress towards the information support needed for health reform," the letter states. "That will ensure that stage 2 (meaningful use) establishes the IT infrastructure necessary to prepare (eligible professionals) and hospitals adequately for the delivery systems reforms that are central to the Affordable Care Act."

The meaningful-use work group arrived at its conclusions after considering the testimony of more than 100 people representing health IT vendors, providers and others at seven full-day hearings over a several-month period, according to the letter. The work group also conducted conference calls, in-person meetings, and received written comments from 422 organizations over the last nine months.

The letter also contains several pages of detailed revisions to various components of the meaningful use standards. The full health IT committee met today. It can accept, reject or revise the work group's recommendation, Modern Healthcare reports.