American Academy of Ophthalmology Develops Checklist to Help Members Achieve Meaningful Use of Electronic Health Records
July 25, 2011
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has launched a program to provide a financial incentive for the “meaningful use” of certified electronic health record (EHR) technology. CMS hopes that doctors who implement and meaningfully use EHR systems will reduce medical errors, and improve medical decisionmaking.
“Meaningful use” (MU) has several components:
- The use of a certified EHR in a meaningful manner, such as e-prescribing.
- The use of certified EHR technology for electronic exchange of health information to improve quality of health care.
- The use of certified EHR technology to submit clinical quality and other measures.
Earlier this month, the American Academy of Ophthalmology announced creation of a checklist to help ophthalmologists comply with meaningful use, and make EHR systems as intuitive and efficient as possible for ophthalmology practices. The list sets forth seventeen essential, and six desirable features in EHR systems for ophthalmology practices in the areas of clinical documentation, ophthalmic vital signs and laboratory studies, medical and surgical management, and ophthalmic measurement and imaging devices. Some of the feature recommendations include:
- Supporting documentation with respect to transitions between the office and operating room
- Capturing, tracking and displaying “vital signs of the eye,” such as visual acuity
- Incorporating hand-drawn sketches or annotations into records
Read more on the Healthcare IT News website.
Read the AAO press release.
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