News: ONC delays implementation of interoperability final rule due to COVID-19

CMS and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) announced the delay of the deadline for implementation of the interoperability final rule, reported Revenue Cycle Advisor. The announcement cited the need for hospitals to focus entirely on the COVID-19 pandemic as the reason for this delay.

The Interoperability and Patient Access Rule includes several new policies that aim to break down barriers in the health system and allow patients to more easily access their health information. Hospitals, psychiatric hospitals, and critical access hospitals will be required to show that their EHR system sends event notifications that include patient name, treating practitioner name, sending institution name, and, if not prohibited by other applicable law, patient diagnosis, reported Revenue Cycle Advisor.

For CDI professionals, this additional transparency adds another justification for CDI chart reviews. Not only does the documentation contained in the medical record need to be accurate and complete for coding and reimbursement purposes, but under this new rule it needs to be understandable and clear from the patient perspective as well.

In the previously published version of the rule, hospitals were given six months to implement these changes. However, with the CMS and ONC announcement of delaying because of COVID-19, the deadline for implementation is now 12 months from the publication of the final rule. The final rule is scheduled to publish on May 1, meaning implementation of the event notification system will be required no earlier than May 1, 2021.

Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in Revenue Cycle Advisor. ACDIS coverage of he previously published Interoperability and Patient Access Rule can be found here. The CMS/ONC announcement can be found here.