Gordon Gillerman — chief of the standards division of the National Institute of Standards and Technology — said officials might push for an accreditation organization to oversee the Certification Commission for Healthcare IT, Modern Healthcare reports.
Gillerman delivered a presentation for the Health IT Policy Committee’s certification and adoption work group.
He said an organization such as the American National Standards Institute could serve as a watchdog for CCHIT.
Gillerman added that he does not foresee NIST becoming involved in accrediting certification groups. Rather, he said, NIST could help the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT develop an appropriate accreditation process (Conn, Modern Healthcare, 7/14).
CCHIT as Sole Certifier
In related news, the Electronic Health Record Association on Monday sent a comment letter to the Health IT Policy Committee’s certification and adoption work group urging officials to designate CCHIT as the single certifying body for electronic health records.
The EHR association is part of the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society, which co-founded CCHIT.
The EHR group said it “supports CCHIT as the single certifying entity to avoid duplication of effort, unnecessary expense and confusion in the market.”
The association added that CCHIT certification should ensure that a health IT system “is a qualified, comprehensive EHR and is capable of enabling providers to achieve ‘meaningful use’ requirements” (Goedert, Health Data Management, 7/14). More Here EMR