Report: 40% of MU Requirements 'Hidden'

The enrollment for the Meaningful Use incentives began on January 3, 2011. For physicians (“Eligible Professionals”), the core requirements in demonstrating Meaningful use include not just prescription writing, but also problem list, allergies, smoking status, and vital signs. EPs must also meet five additional requirements selected from a menu of ten optional requirements. Quality reporting is one of the core requirements.

From the standpoint of capturing the data needed for the EP quality measures, even when laboratory test results and medication reconciliation are implemented as part of Stage 1 meaningful use, 40 percent of the data elements are still missing. The remaining 40 percent are the hidden requirements of meaningful use.

In the report, “Physician Quality Reporting — The Hidden Requirements of Meaningful Use” CSC looks at the aggregate data capture challenge for a health system or large medical group in which the electronic health record (EHR) must be implemented so that all of the necessary information is documented by providers rather than from the perspective of an individual EP who must report on only six measures. In the whitepaper, CSC answers the following questions:
• What types of medical record information are required for the set of measures?
• How many of the data elements are captured during registration and encounter management?
• How much of the needed information will be available once the EPs in the health system or medical group have met all of the Stage 1 core functional requirements? Optional requirements involving data capture?
• Beyond explicit Stage 1 functional Requirements, what else is needed?