NIOSH eNews FLASH

Now is the time to provide your comments on the value of work information in Electronic Health Records (EHRs)!

On March 30, 2015, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking detailing planned changes to the rules for certification of EHR software. The deadline to submit comments is May 8, 2015.

The Notice includes a request for comments on future inclusion of a patient’s current and past occupation, the industry in which he or she works (or worked), and other work information, in the criteria that the government will use to certify EHR software that doctors and hospitals use. Inclusion means that certified EHR software would have to be capable of capturing and retaining patient industry and occupation and perhaps other work information. Among the information being sought: HHS requests information from healthcare providers on the usefulness of information about patient work. NIOSH supports changes to EHR certification that would make it easier to record, capture and retain information about a patient’s work. Access to work information is vital not only for effective care and treatment of working patients, but also for generating data that can be used in identifying and monitoring trends to better prevent future work-related injuries and illnesses.

The Federal Register notice can be found here:

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2015-03-30/pdf/2015-06612.pdf Adobe PDF file