In Case You Missed It

In This Issue

Interoperability Proving Ground – Year in Review

Early in 2016, ONC launched the Interoperability Proving Ground (IPG) – an open, community source for health IT stakeholders to share and learn about interoperability efforts across the United States. What started with 30 active and 15 completed projects grew to 258 active and 78 completed projects in more 30 states and four countries!

Throughout the year, we made a number of upgrades: implementing a subscription feature that allows registered users to get daily, weekly, or monthly email notifications based on their interoperability interests; expanding entries to include international projects; enhancing our map search; and enabling bulk uploading for new projects. In the final quarter of the calendar year, the IPG totaled more than 63,000 visits by more than 2,600 unique users.

We encourage you to start 2017 off by adding your project to the IPG and to leverage the IPG as a health IT resource to learn about and share efforts that advance the interoperable exchange of health information. Visit the IPG today!

Hitting Refresh: Health IT Playbook Update

The ONC Health IT Playbook has been refreshed! There is additional content on workforce trainings and improved usability through updated icons, links, and tool display. The most prominent addition is the inclusion of ONC’s workforce webinars which you can view under the Transformation Support Section. We encourage users to review this helpful resource and share your feedback with us to improve its content, which is refreshed regularly.

CMS, AHRQ, and ONC Integrate eCQI Resource Center with USHIK

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), and ONC have integrated the eCQI Resource Center with United States Health Information Knowledgebase (USHIK). USHIK is a publicly available database with technical measures and specifications for calculating quality metrics established for federal payment reimbursements. The recent integration allows users to compare different versions and metadata of electronic Clinical Quality Measures. Users can also download measure version details in several file formats for use in different software programs. The new functionality is found in the measure tables: Eligible Hospitals and Eligible Professionals.

ICD-10 Update on eCQM Value Sets for 2017 Performance Period

In response to feedback on changes introduced into International Classification of Diseases (ICD)-10 in fiscal year 2017, CMS, and the National Library of Medicine (NLM) will update all impacted electronic Clinical Quality Measure (eCQM) value sets for the 2017 performance period.

CMS will issue an addendum to the 2016 eCQM Specifications (i.e., 2016 Annual Update published in April 2016) to update relevant ICD-10-CM and ICD-10-PCS eCQM value sets for the 2017 performance year. These changes will affect electronic reporting of eCQMs for the following programs:

The Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting (IQR) Program
The Medicare Electronic Health Record (EHR) Incentive Program for eligible hospitals and critical access hospitals
The Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) for MIPS eligible clinicians

These changes will only affect the value sets for the eCQMs. The Health Quality Measure Format (HQMF) specifications, the value set object identifiers (OIDs), and the measure version numbers for 2017 eCQM reporting will not change. All changes to the eCQM value sets will be made available through the National Library of Medicine’s Value Set Authority Center starting in early to mid- January 2017. CMS will issue communication once published.

For further assistance on the addendum, eCQM value sets, appropriateness of mapping, and non-ICD-10 code system updates, please submit questions to the ONC CQM Issue Tracker.