New 2021 Resources for Promoting Interoperability

Learn More About Medicare Promoting Interoperability Program Requirements and New Resources for 2021

In the Fiscal Year (FY) 2021 Medicare Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment Systems (IPPS) for Acute Care Hospitals and the Long-term Care Hospital (LTCH) Prospective Payment System Final Rule, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Service (CMS) finalized changes and requirements for the Medicare Promoting Interoperability Program for eligible hospitals, critical access hospitals (CAHs), and dual-eligible hospitals attesting to CMS.

Below are requirements and new resources available for Medicare Promoting Interoperability Program participants for the 2021 reporting period.

Changes for 2021 include:

  • Maintaining the Electronic Prescribing objective’s Query of Prescription Drug Monitoring Program measure as optional and worth five bonus points.
  • Modifying the name of the Support Electronic Referral Loops by Receiving and Incorporating Health Information measure, included in the Health Information Exchange objective, to Support Electronic Referral Loops by Receiving and Reconciling Health Information.
  • Increasing the number of electronic clinical quality measure (eCQMs) data reported from one self-selected quarter to two self-selected quarters of data.

The following requirements will remain:

  • A minimum of any continuous, self-selected, 90-day electronic health record (EHR) reporting period.
  • Participants must report on four objectives:
    • Electronic Prescribing
    • Health Information Exchange
    • Provider to Patient Exchange
    • Public Health and Clinical Data Exchange
  • CMS will continue to implement a performance-based scoring methodology with scoring occurring for each of the individual measures.
  • Report on four self-selected eCQMs of the nine available.
  • Submit a “Yes” to the following:
    • Security Risk Analysis measure
    • Prevention of Information Blocking Attestations
    • ONC Direct Review Attestation

Certified electronic health record technology (CEHRT) requirements include:

Additional Resources

Below are new resources for Medicare Promoting Interoperability Program participants:

For More Information

For more information on the Medicare Promoting Interoperability Program, please visit the Promoting Interoperability Programs website