Meaningful Use 101
Have questions about Meaningful Use? Get answers quickly by navigating to your question below.
- What is Meaningful Use?
- Who is qualified for Meaningful Use?
- How do Meaningful Use criteria work?
- How much can I make?
- How do I get started?
- Who is in charge of Meaningful Use?
What is Meaningful Use?
Meaningful Use is a government program that encourages medical providers to adopt and use an EHR by providing up to $44,000 per eligible provider ($63,750 for eligible Medicaid professionals). Incentive funds are designed to help doctors make the transition to electronic records and can be used at the individual physician’s discretion.
To receive payments, you need to demonstrate a set of 20 Meaningful Use criteria that serve as a roadmap for effective EHR adoption. During your first year in the program, you will only have to fulfill the criteria over a shortened 90-day reporting period—which can be started by October 3rd each year.
You can get started in less than five minutes on our free EHR—start today to beat this year’s deadline!
Who is qualified for Meaningful Use?
If you see Medicare or Medicaid patients, you may be eligible for Meaningful Use incentives.
How do Meaningful Use criteria work?
Meaningful Use includes 15 core criteria that you must meet to prove effective use of an EHR in your practice. You also must choose five out of 10 menu criteria to fulfill. During your first year in the Medicare program, you will only have to fulfill the criteria over a 90-day reporting period, after which you must demonstrate the criteria year round. If you qualify for the Medicaid program, you only need to adopt an EHR in your first year, followed by a 90-day reporting period in Year 2 and full-year reporting periods thereafter.
Core Set
All 15 measures required| Measure | Threshold | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Demographics | 50% of patients seen |
| 2 | Vitals | BP and BMI (50%) |
| 3 | Problem list | ICD-9-CM or SNOMED (80%) |
| 4 | Active medication list | (80%) |
| 5 | Medication allergies | (80%) |
| 6 | Smoking status | (50%) |
| 7 | Patient clinical visit summry | (50% in 3 days) |
| 8 | Hospital discharge instructions or Patient with electronic copy |
(50%) or (50% in 3 days) |
| 9 | e-Prescribing | (40%) |
| 10 | CPOE | (30% including a med) |
| 11 | Drug-drug and drug-allergy interactions | (functionality enabled) |
| 12 | Exchange critical information | (perform test) |
| 13 | Clinical decision support | (one rule) |
| 14 | Security risk analysis | |
| 15 | Report clinical quality | (BP, BMI, Smoke, plus 3 others) |
Menu Set
Select 5 of 10 measures| Measure | Threshold | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Drug formulary checks | One report |
| 2 | Structured lab results | 40% of patients seen |
| 3 | Patients by conditions | One report |
| 4 | Send patient-specific education | 10% of patients seen |
| 5 | Medication reconciliation | 50% of patients seen |
| 6 | Summary care record at transitions | 50% of patients seen |
| 7 | Feed immunization registries | Perform at least one test |
| 8 | Feed syndromic surveillance | Perform at least one test |
| 9 | Send reminders to patients for preventative and follow-up care | 20% > 65yrs. < 5yrs. |
| 10 | Patient electronic access to labs, problems, meds and allergies | 10% in 4 days |
After your first 2-3 years of the program (Stage 1), you will be expected to adopt additional criteria to achieve Meaningful Use in Stages 2 and 3 of the program. These stages are established by the government to encourage providers to expand upon their EHR usage to further improve care in the US healthcare system:
Stage 1: Basic EHR adoption to capture clinical data electronically
Stage 2: Promoting health information sharing between providers and greater patient engagement with their personal electronic records
Stage 3: Expanding and solidifying Meaningful Use objectives to improve health outcomes
| 1st year | Stage of Meaningful Use | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | |
| 2011 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | TBD | TBD | TBD | TBD |
| 2012 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | TBD | TBD | TBD | TBD | |
| 2013 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | TBD | TBD | TBD | ||
| 2014 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | TBD | TBD | |||
| 2015 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | TBD | ||||
| 2016 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | |||||
| 2017 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | ||||||
How much can I make?
Providers who start in 2013 can receive up to $39,000 in Medicare incentives. The amount of incentives you can earn will drop in 2014, the last year you can begin Meaningful Use and still earn incentives.
Note that annual Medicare incentive payments are 75% of your total annual Medicare Part B allowed charges up to a maximum yearly payment amount (see below) . If you earn less than 75% of the maximum incentive payment during a reporting year, your incentive payment will be disbursed the following March based on your Medicare Part B reimbursements during the reporting year.
After 2014, you face up to 5% in Medicare fee reductions if you have yet to adopt an EHR:
| Adopted in... | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | No Adoption |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | $18,000 | ||||
| 2012 | $12,000 | $18,000 | |||
| 2013 | $8,000 | $12,000 | $15,000 | ||
| 2014 | $4,000 | $8,000 | $12,000 | $12,000 | |
| 2015 | $2,000 | $4,000 | $8,000 | $8,000 | -1% |
| 2016 | $2,000 | $4,000 | $4,000 | -2% | |
| 2017 | -3% | ||||
| Total | $44,000 | $44,000 | $39,000 | $24,000 |
If you are a Medicaid-eligible provider, you have until 2016 to pursue $63,750 in incentives. As the Medicaid EHR incentive programs are administered by the states, you should consult the CMS state program list to find more accurate information about your state’s payment calculation and schedule.
| Adopted in... | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | $21,500 | |||||
| 2012 | $8,500 | $21,250 | ||||
| 2013 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $21,250 | |||
| 2014 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $21,250 | ||
| 2015 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $21,250 | |
| 2016 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $21,500 |
| 2017 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | |
| 2018 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | ||
| 2019 | $8,500 | $8,500 | $8,500 | |||
| 2020 | $8,500 | $8,500 | ||||
| 2021 | $8,500 | |||||
| Total | $63,750 | $63,750 | $63,750 | $63,750 | $63,750 | $63,750 |
How do I get started?
Once you check your eligibility, the first step is to sign up with a certified EHR. You can get started in less than five minutes with our free EHR, making it the easiest and simplest way to begin pursuing incentives.
After signing up, download our Action Plan for a quick resource guide on achieving your criteria. Once you familiarize yourself with the criteria, all you need to do is begin following them in your practice while using your EHR. Our daily live webinars with our Meaningful Use experts can help you get started quickly and learn best practices.
With our daily Meaningful Use Dashboard updates and criteria Gap Report, it’s easy to check your progress and see where you may need to catch up. Our free, award-winning Meaningful Use support can also answer any questions you have moving forward.
Who oversees Meaningful Use?
HITECH Act Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health ActThe HITECH Act allocates $19 billion in funds to promote the adoption of Meaningful Use certified EHRs by hospitals and providers. The HITECH act is part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA or the “stimulus plan”) signed into law by President Obama in 2009, which includes $59 billion in healthcare initiatives.
CMS Center for Medicare and Medicare ServicesCMS is in charge of distributing incentives to eligible providers. All providers and hospitals pursuing Meaningful Use must register and attest with CMS to receive their incentives.
ONC Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information TechnologyFounded in 2004 within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the ONC leverages funds from the HITECH Act to oversee Meaningful Use certification for EHR technology and set national goals for health IT adoption. The ONC also manages over 70 regional extension centers (RECs), which provide local EHR assistance for providers.