Federal Officials Release New EHR Format for Pediatric Care

On Wednesday, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and CMS released a new electronic health record format for pediatric care, Health Data Management reports (Goedert, Health Data Management, 2/7).

Goals of New Format

The new format aims to help EHR vendors develop modules that are tailored to children’s health needs (McKinney, Modern Healthcare, 2/7).

Officials said the new format was warranted because current EHR systems are not appropriately set up to capture or process children’s health data, resulting in lower EHR adoption rates among pediatric physicians.

Recommended Data Elements, Functionalities

The new EHR format outlines a minimum set of data elements and standards that could serve as a blueprint for EHR developers. The recommended data elements and functionalities are grouped into topic areas, such as:

• Age- and weight-based dosing;
• Child abuse reporting;
• Growth data plotting;
• Immunization decision support tools;
• Information for children with special needs; and
• Prenatal and newborn screening tests (McCann, Healthcare IT News, 2/7).

The new format also includes guidance on interoperability to facilitate information exchange between inpatient, primary care and school-based settings (Health Data Management, 2/7).

Next Steps

AHRQ officials said the new format will be tested in Pennsylvania and North Carolina.

In addition, CMS officials said they are looking to integrate the new format into later editions of the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT’s standards and certification criteria for EHR systems. Under the 2009 federal economic stimulus package, health care providers who demonstrate meaningful use of certified EHR systems can qualify for Medicaid and Medicare incentive payments (Healthcare IT News, 2/7).