An Aug. 2 final rule for Medicare’s Inpatient Prospective Payment System for fiscal year 2020 will increase inpatient operating payments and Medicare disproportionate share hospital funding and make changes to electronic health records use and quality reporting programs.

America’s Essential Hospitals encouraged the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to consider the disproportionately negative financial effect on essential hospitals of certain quality reporting requirements and administrative burden in the Promoting Interoperability Programs.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services updated the Promoting Interoperability Programs website with new resources for the 2019 program year. The agency also announced two calls on the recently released interoperability and patient access proposed rule.

The change aims to simplify data reporting for hospitals, as most already use the QualityNet portal for communications and quality data exchange.

GAO report identifies these challenges and reviews nonfederal initiatives to overcome them. Some of the initiatives suggest that criteria for EHR certification in the Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs isn't sufficient for interoperability.