Trade groups join forces for EHR certification

Health Management Technology, Oct, 2004

Three industry groups are joining forces and funds to establish certification guidelines for ambulatory electronic health record (EHR) systems. The American Health Information Management Association, the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society and the National Alliance for Health Information Technology have committed initial staff and funding to launch the private-sector effort. They have invited key leaders and stakeholders to join an industrywide board that will steer the certification initiative.

"A private sector EHR certification is one of the market agents that does not exist today and is necessary for the healthcare industry to realize better value from our investment in health information technology," said David Brailer, M.D., Ph.D., HHS national health information technology coordinator. The trade groups are looking for physician and clinician participation to better understand end-user needs; for the vendor community to understand application development requirements; and for payers to ensure for the right criteria are in place to establish incentives for IT adoption.