Meaningful Use
At a recent party hosted by a fast-paced couple-one a nephrologist and the other an MD researcher specializing in Lyme- I brought up the #mhealth summit and the use of mobile technology in “meaningful use” , bringing shivers, convulsions and conniptions to every stethoscope wielder in this discussion.
For those not in the know, “meaningful use” is the Health insurance System’s formulary of what Health Care Providers should document that they have done, ordered, diagnosed and treated. To old-school practitioners, who lived off fees via service to service (much like check-to-check or blood donation to blood donation for the paupers among you readers), “meaningful use” is a hugely meaningless taskbar that requires numerous, tedious “clicking” along the patients’ #EHR, and being sure to document the “right” ICD code to match up with the “right diagnosis”.
Goodhearted practitioners will quipp- “I already know my healthcare provisions are meaningful. I think it is just another loop the HMO’s have us running around while they cook up something else.”
Unfortunately, this attitude has totally spoiled “meaningful use for practitioners in the mainstream who have been out in practice for a while. In my humble observation.
However, if #PPACA begins to reimburse more tantalizingly for preventative care, and CMS actually starts spankin’ practitioners who OVerperscribe ABX for short term sinusitis, non-bacterial nasopharingitis…..I am pleased with that.
On the other hand, it is very well known that “magically”, all across the land, patients have simply dried up their non-bacterial ICDs and begun to “magically” aquire the second and third diagnosis codes that “magically” make ABX therapy okay. This is the prime exampleof how “meaningful use measures” are rapidly interpretated, and then “worked around.”
What’s a new healthcare practitioner to do in order not to become warped by the older generations hell-bent opposition to meaningful use? Has #PPACA truly changed the meaning of”meaningful”? Am I just a naive student-practitioner? Most importantly, how many “clicks” does it take to document “meaningful use” and will I develop a rampant case of carpal tunnel before I am 30?
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