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What is the Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act?

The Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act (MIPPA), passed in July 2008, contains several new authorities and requirements for quality reporting and PQRI for 2009 and beyond.  The program establishes both financial incentives for electronically prescribing in many physician practices and penalties for those that do not adopt by a certain threshold date.

Any medical professional defined as 'eligible' by CMS may participate.  Those wishing to participate must use a 'qualified' e-prescribing system and report their use of e-prescribing per the requirements of the program.  Section 132 of MIPAA contains the new electronic prescribing incentive provisions.

Vsit the CMS web site for the latest information: www.cms.hhs.gov/erxincentive

Where can I find statistics on e-prescribing growth and use?

Surescripts publishes an annual update of national and state e-prescribing adoption and utilization statistics on our web site. For custom data requests, please contact reporting@surescripts.com.

Where can I find Surescripts’ position on policy issues such as Meaningful Use, the HITECH Act, Controlled Substances, and Standards?

Please visit our Policy Corner page for the latest updates on issues and polices in and around e-prescribing as well as special commentary by Surescripts policy experts.

How can I get involved in driving e-prescribing adoption and use?

Many state-supported e-prescribing pilot programs are designed to help contain the rising costs of state-funded Medicaid programs. Other state initiatives focus more broadly on developing programs to accelerate the adoption of e-prescribing and EHRs and models to leverage regional health information organizations (RHIOs).

E-prescribing is generally addressed in two different ways on the state level. First, via a targeted approach where legislation provides incentives for adoption and use of e-prescribing, or creating demonstration projects to assess the financial and efficiency gains of e-prescribing. Second, legislative approaches sometimes roll e-prescribing requirements into larger health reform bills.

Surescripts can help support your efforts to promote e-prescribing with important data and information for presentations. Click here to request more information