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Contributing Writer · Jul 20, 2011

EHR Meaningful Use: Core Measures 10 and 11

Meaningful EHR Use requirements can be very confusing. The main issue is the extensive amount of data that providers encounter and a lack of easily understandable and actionable steps. In this series of blog posts, I will address some of the major questions I have heard from providers and simplify Meaningful Use language to make it more understandable.

As a reminder, eligible providers must achieve 20 criteria (15 core and 5 menu) as defined by the government for a period of 90 days. Upon doing so and attesting to this fact, providers will receive 75% of their allowable Medicare charges (up to $18,000 this year) as an incentive.

Core Requirement 10: Report Clinical Quality Measures
Reporting clinical quality measures (CQM) tends to keep providers up at night. Although this represents just one of the fifteen core (required) Meaningful Use measures, it feels much larger once you dive in to the many CQM that you can choose.

As an eligible Meaningful Use provider, you need to choose a total of six CQM. For each CQM, you will run a report (this is automated in Practice Fusion). Each report will give you the relevant pieces of information that you will send to CMS (entered and sent during the CMS attestation process).

Three of the CQM you choose must be from the core or alternative core CQM. There are a total of six of these measures. Three of the CQM you choose must be from a list of 38 menu measures. It is important to note that most EHRs will only initially offer a subset of these 38. The CQM that you select should be relevant to your practice.

The data for the CQM reports will come directly from the EHR. Some of this information will be collected during your regular clinical work flow and some will require additional data collection.

The bottom line though is that your qualification for EHR incentives is solely based on running the report and attesting to the results. It is not based on what those results actually are.

Core Requirement 11: Clinical Decision Support Rule Enabled
Clinical Decision Support (CDS) is one of the easiest measures to fulfill. The rule states that one clinical decision support rule must be enabled for the entire 90-day reporting period. Once the rule is enabled, you have nothing more to do.

In Practice Fusion, the CDS rule is enabled upon adoption by default. As long as you do not turn this rule off during your 90-day period, you fulfill this requirement. The CDS rule that Practice Fusion has opted to implement is related to checking blood pressure for patients with a history of hypertension. Again, this is enabled by default and, whether or not it is relevant to your practice, it counts for Meaningful Use.