The Maryland Health Care Commission’s May 2014 update on the activities of the Center for Health Information and Innovative Care Delivery, reports that currently the Center’s staff is analyzing the data collected from the sixth annual “Health Information Technology Assessment of Maryland Hospitals” survey. The survey is used to assess health IT adoption among all 46 acute care hospitals in the state.
The information is collected from hospitals on their adoption of computerized physician order entry, EHRs, medication administration systems, infection management systems, e-prescribing, HIE, use of telemedicine, patient portals as well as participation in CMS EHR Incentive Programs.
The survey shows that in the case of 46 hospitals only two have not adopted an EHR, hospital adoption of e-prescribing increased from 22 percent in 2012 and to about 48 percent in 2013. In general, hospital health IT adoption has increased nine percent over the previous year.
The staff continues to implement strategies to increase participation in the CMS EHR Incentive Program. They are working with the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DHMH), the Chesapeake Regional Information System for our Patients (CRISP), the Maryland Medical Society, and with hospitals to increase participation.
So far, the staff has conducted webinars on meaningful use registration, engaged hospitals in meaningful use outreach with community providers, developed a web-based resource center for meaningful use, and established a Maryland single point of contact to triage and address meaningful use inquiries.
Recently, the staff participated in a CRISP privacy and security subcommittee advisory board meeting. The advisory board discussed how to implement technology that would use existing data to automate audits of user access to the HIE, hire a third party consultant to assess CRISP’s current policies and procedures, and make recommendations to improve privacy and security.
The staff has developed an information brief that discusses the results of the Independent Nursing Home (INH) Health IT Grant Program. The results indicate that HIE services such as the use of the CRISP query portal and Encounter Notification Service (ENS) has been beneficial to long term care facilities in improving access to patient health information and coordinating care for the residents.
In addition, testing has been completed to integrate a web-based advance directive registry. An environmental scan reveals that Maryland is the first state to implement an advance directive registry though a statewide HIE.
The ONC Challenge Grant and DHMH provided funding through June 2014 for the initial implementation of the registry. The staff is now working to secure future funding for the registry’s continued maintenance and use.
The staff convened eight meetings of the 2014 Telemedicine Task Force advisory groups that included three in-person and five virtual meetings. The three task force advisory groups are exploring strategies for diffusing telehealth in the state. The MHCC is required to submit a report to the Governor and General Assembly by December 1, 2014 with recommendations on how to increase telehealth adoption in the state.
The staff also reconvened the Maryland Multi-Payer Patient Centered Medical Home (PCMH) Program Care Manager Workgroup to discuss the redesign of the current care management plan developed by the Maryland Learning Collaborative. The topics being discussed include care manager best practices, optimizing the use of EHRs to improve care delivery, and how to design better workflow practices.
Go to http://mhcc.dhmh.maryland.gov/Documents/cmsnmtgs/updates/MHCC-updt_20140515.pdf to read the full “Maryland Health Care Commission Update on Activities” report.