Citing patient safety concerns and competing priorities, Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Healthcare has decided not to attest to meaningful use in 2014.
Intermountain is currently in the middle of an organizationwide implementation of a Cerner electronic health record system. Intermountain leaders have decided the risks of pursuing meaningful use attestation during the transition, especially to patient safety, outweigh the benefits, according to a statement provided by the health system.
Intermountain will meet the ICD-10 and other payment reform deadlines, and several Intermountain hospitals will attest to year 2 of meaningful use stage 1 using the organization's legacy EHR system.
By not attesting in fiscal year 2014, Intermountain will both forgo incentive payments for this year as well as trigger financial penalties in 2016.
Despite urging from industry stakeholders to relax the meaningful use timeline, CMS Administrator Marilyn Tavenner announced at HIMSS' annual conference last week in Orlando that the attestation deadline would not move, though there will be some flexibility in hardship exemptions in 2014.
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