Stepping away from Meaningful Use for a minute, I want to make sure our readers know about National Health Center Week (Aug 8-14, 2010). All next week, a variety of activities will recognize the work done by Health Centers across the U.S. to provide access to affordable, high quality, cost-effective health care to medically vulnerable and underserved people. NextGen Healthcare has a significant focus on serving Community Health Centers, with over 300 centers using our technology now. We'll be supporting National Health Center Week and our client, LifeLong Medical Care at their 2nd Annual Community Walk on August 13, from 10 am - 4 pm at LifeLong Medical Care, 3260 Sacramento St., Berkeley, Calif. I hope you can participate in some National Health Center Week activities, too.

To kick off the week, NACHC is hosting a tele-town hall today that anyone can dial into. Details below.

For Immediate Release - August 04,2010

Top Administration Health Officials to Participate in a Tele-town Hall Meeting with America’s Health Centers

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, along with Health Resources and Services Administrator Mary Wakefield, Ph.D., will participate in a tele-town hall meeting hosted by the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC) at 3 pm EST on Friday, August 6th. They will discuss the latest news related to Community Health Centers and the impact on communities of the landmark Affordable Care Act. They will be joined by a health center clinician, Gary Wiltz, MD, CEO of Teche Action Clinic, Inc. in Franklin, LA; Velma Hendershott, President & CEO of Intercare Community Health Network, Bangor, MI; and Tom Van Coverden, President and CEO of NACHC.

The tele-town hall meeting will kick off National Health Center Week 2010 (August 8-14th), a national campaign that celebrates the mission of America’s Health Centers and their 45 year record of accomplishment in delivering excellent, preventive care to communities in need.  NHCW comes as the nation’s health centers prepare to expand their services under the new health reform law and transform the nation’s health care delivery system through prevention.

WHAT: Tele-town Hall Meeting

WHO: HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius; HRSA Administrator Mary Wakefield, NACHC President CEO Tom Van Coverden; Velma Hendershott, President & CEO of Intercare Community Health Network, Bangor, MI.

WHEN: Friday, August 6, 2010, 3 p.m. EST

Health center professionals, board members and patients who have not already registered may participate by callingl 1-877-229-8493, enter ID 15035 and PIN 2.

Members of the press are invited to listen in: 1.877.229.8493. Press 15035 for ID and pin 1.

Last week, we delivered our first of many public webinars on the final Meaningful Use criteria. This one focused on ambulatory providers, but we will also address the inpatient market in a webinar series starting next Monday, August 2nd 3:00 PM ET.

Click below to open the slides from the ambulatory presentation. First they provide an update on the Regional Extension Center program and then take a detailed walk through the final MU ruling, including the core set of 15 measures that all eligible providers are required to meet and the menu of 10 additional measures from which providers must choose five to demonstrate. The presentation should help you identify what changed from the preliminary ruling and what stayed the same. It also reviews the timeline for the EHR incentive program through 2021 and lists other Medicare Incentive Programs an eligible provider can participate in while also pursuing Meaningful Use.

If you’re looking for a synopsis of the final Meaningful Use criteria, a great summary article was posted on the New England Journal of Medicine website, including a chart of the final sets of objectives and measures. It’s authored by David Blumenthal, national coordinator for health information technology at the Department of Health and Human Services, and Marilyn Tavenner, principal deputy administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, so it also provides some good context about the important of Meaningful Use regulation and the primary changes that were made since the preliminary ruling earlier this year.

The full document from CMS with the final Meaningful Use criteria is also available for public viewing. But make sure you have a comfortable seat when reading it – it’s 864 pages!

The Meaningful Use criteria just came out, health reform is in full swing, and laws like the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act are starting to impact the way we deliver healthcare. We could not be at a more important and critical juncture for healthcare IT.

But how do you keep up with all the information you need to make informed decisions? NextGen Healthcare has always been devoted to educating physicians and hospitals on the latest regulations, issues and innovations that impact them. Our goal with this blog is to complement our Health Reform Center, busy webinar schedule, product/services pages and other resources with valuable, actionable information for readers.

With Meaningful Use at the top of mind, let’s start there. Stay tuned for as much information as we can think of that will help you get to Meaningful Use. For example, here's a short video with my initial reaction to the final critera: http://www.youtube.com/user/nghisinc#p/a/u/0/x7_Xwj06cm8.

I encourage you to comment if you have any suggestions for topics you would like to see us address, or if you have feedback to share. Thanks for visiting the NextGen blog.