Request for personal experiences with CCHIT certification

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elidan replied on 06-30-2009 7:45 PM

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Aren't the AMDIS folks associated with HIMSS? If so, why would you expect them to say anything else?

Margalit Gur-Arie

My brand new Blog: On Healthcare Technology

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alborg replied on 06-30-2009 9:23 PM

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Hi Rick:

Some people believe that the end always justifies the means. Although Las Vegas nowadays is a lovely city, it was established by the Mafia and continues to be beholden to the Mafia. Same with CCHIT- it was established by vendors to manipulate the market in a pseudo-legal manner and remains to this day a shady process.

When CCHIT was started, the HHS had a dream- they wanted an interoperable system that would save them money, increase quality, and decrease errors. These were things promised by AHIMA/HIMSS, none of which have yet to be achieved. One of the hospitals that I go to have installed GE Centricity and sure, it is a beautiful setup, with computers all over the place, electronic whiteboards, nice color screens, but will it actually increase quality over a very nicely done paper record environment? We don't know, and if you look at 2 studies in the past, the answer would be "NO", as a well done paper quality PQRI system would come out with as good a final result as a "enterprise" computer setup.

It was the perfect storm- there was the need, there were the promises, and of course, "the other guy", the doctors, would end up footing the bill. Why wouldn't the HHS not want to go in with AHIMA/HIMSS/CCHIT and then try to force the physicians into submission by any way possible? Why do you think that those who were asked to contribute were everyone but clinicians?

CCHIT has:

failed to dissociate itself from AHIMA/HIMSS,
it has failed to truly operate as a legal not-for-profit reincorporating itself twice,
it has failed in its quest for interoperability,
it has failed at increasing the uptake of EMR,
it has failed to offer true "assurance" to physicians,
and it has been degraded into promoting c-EHR systems irrespective of the standards that they so professed to be so important.

They even offer a $150 "certification" license to extort whatever they can from the staunchest holdouts, which makes them even closer to actually flauting the RICO anti-racketeering laws that I first mentioned some 2.5 years ago here ( http://www.emrupdate.com/forums/p/7953/60493.aspx )... if they lose the backing of the HHS, as what has happened under HITECH, I'm sure that some will want the FBI to look into its business practices.

Al

Al Borges, M.D.