HITECH INTRODUCTION

The HITECH act was implemented by U.S congress in order to ensure meaningful adaptation of EHR technology and confirms the providers under Medicare and Medicaid will get payment through the incentives by acceptance of this technology. The main goals under the act are as follows:

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 identified three main components of meaningful use: the use of a certified EHR in a meaningful manner, electronic exchange of health information to improve quality of care, and the use of technology to submit clinical outcomes and quality measures (Heath Resources and Service Administration, n.d.). ARRA includes many measures to modernize our nation’s infrastructure, with the “Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act” being an example. The HITECH Act is an effort led by Centers for Medicare and Medicare Services (CMS) in support of electronic health records and meaningful use (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, CDC 2016). According to Galbraith (2013), the HITECH Act aims to promote the use of EHRs by providing over $27 billion in monetary incentives for health care providers that become “meaningful users”. CMS uses these core objectives to determine if a health care provider has satisfied meaningful use and is eligible to receive financial incentives (Galbraith, 2013).

The Affordable Care Act of 2010 marks a new era in American health care. Yet in many ways, this era began more than a year earlier, with the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 and its Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) provisions. Although HITECH may be viewed narrowly as legislation to

HITECH stands for The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act It is legislation that was created and signed in 2009 by President Obama. The electronic health records (HER) legislation activate the adoption and embracing technology in the United States. HITECH signed by President Obama into law on Feb. 17, 2009, as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) economic stimulus bill.

A significant investment to encourage the adoption of electronic health records (EHRs) by healthcare providers was made by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The EHR Incentive Program, which financially rewards providers for using EHRs and meeting all CMS program requirements, was launched by CMS in the year 2011. All healthcare providers (private or public) are required to adopt and demonstrate ‘meaningful use’ of electronic health records for maintaining their existing Medicaid and Medicare reimbursement levels (Cite). A set of penalties for healthcare providers who fail to meet the deadline have already been defined by the U.S. government. Healthcare providers failing to introduce EHR systems by the year 2015 will experience a one percent reduction in Medicare reimbursements in that year, a two percent reduction in the year 2016, a three percent reduction in the year 2017, followed by a reduction of up to a 95 percent reduction in reimbursements over a period of

HIPAA and HITECH lay out strict standards governing information security and privacy of patient information. While HIPAA/HITECH may be a boon to the security of healthcare information, they also throw up a number of challenges like high costs, tracking regulatory changes, extensive documentation and several others. HITECH is the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act, which brings additional compliance standards to healthcare organizations. It is directly related to HIPAA, and was part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.EHR systems can also offer increased patient privacy & security when compared to traditional paper records. Encrypted electronic patient records can be protected against unauthorized

In 2009, even though electronic health records (EHRs) were available, many hospitals were still using paper charting. EHR technology is expensive and, consequently, was being deterred. Therefore, HITECH was enacted.

In 2009, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) were passed by the Obama legislation to try and improve healthcare for Americans by reducing costs and improving quality. The ARRA is commonly known as the ‘stimulus package’. The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) act was part of the ARRA to help improve our country’s infrastructure. HITECH supports electronic health records– meaningful use (EHR-MU) which is led by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC). HITECH allocated over $27 billion in funds to help encourage the healthcare industry in

In July 2010 CMS Centers of Medicaid and Medicare services published a final rule which established three phases of the EHR Incentive Program. The Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Program provides financial incentives for the “meaningful use” (MU) of certified Electronic Health Record technology to improve patient care. 36$ billion was authorized.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act signed into law in 2009, includes the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act known as the HITECH Act. The act defined specific requirements for receiving financial incentives for ‘meaningful use’ of the electronic health record (EHR). Hospitals and providers could begin implementation of the requirements in 2011 to receive the incentives by meeting specific objectives, after 2015 failure to meet meaningful use requirements will result in penalties. Meaningful use is divided into 3 stages and each stage has objectives and requirements specific to that stage. Hospitals and providers must meet requirements for Stage 1 of meaningful use for two years before

So much so that our political leaders and President Barack Obama have created a stimulus package called the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Within this legislature, improvements to our healthcare industry and systems have been made with long-term financial savings in mind. As technology and uniformed data was becoming the standard in healthcare, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act has accelerated the speed. “The number of certified EHR vendors in the United States has increased from 605,6 to more than 10007 since mid-2008” (Sitting and Singh, 2012). Healthcare organizations now have no choice but to invest in a new

In order to accelerate the use of health information technology, the U.S. government enacted the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

As a result, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act was enacted by the federal government in 2009 (Blumenthal, 2010). This act was to improve quality, safety, and efficiency while enhancing patient privacy

HITECH Act provides billions of dollars in incentive payments through Medicare and Medicaid programs to providers that meaningfully use EHR. The HITECH Act also revised many segments of the Social Security Act (SSA) and in doing so, recognized the accessibility of incentive payments to providers to encourage the acceptance and Meaningful Use of Certified Electronic Health Record Technology (CEHRT). The ARRA provides the incentives to the following groups: hospitals, healthcare clinics, private practices, nursing facilities, long term health care facilities, and metal institutions.

In 2009, American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) was passed into law as a stimulus package in efforts to reverse the financial recession in the United States. Part of the legislation included, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act that incentivized hospitals and physician practices to adopt certified electronic health records (EHR) and to encourage the use of health care technology in a meaningful way (Falk, 2014). The ultimate goal of HITECH and Meaningful Use (MU) is to create a national healthcare infrastructure that is connected, develop systems to warehouse and share data, and in turn improve care and efficiencies for patients and providers (Blumenthal & Tavenner, 2010). The raid adoption