Intended to assist in ensuring full use and understanding of capabilities of current system and assessing the need for additional population health management or data integration tools, this checklist describes the steps health center quality improvement and IT staff can take to ensure they are maximizing the population health management and other capacity of current systems. It Included are questions around the system itself, report generation, training, and resulting data, as well as considerations before and after you contact your vendor.

Provider satisfaction is of critical importance for health centers to promote safety and workforce stability. A 2013 survey found that dissatisfied physicians were 2-3 times more likely to leave medical practice than their more satisfied colleagues. This may be unsurprising given that another recent study found that physicians spend almost half of their day on the EHR and desk work. Even during the patient visit, 37 percent of the time in the exam room is spent on these tasks. The increase in clerical and documentation burden related to EHR adoption was cited as a contributor to provider dissatisfaction. This resource puts forth several options for assessing provider satisfaction or burden, with a focus on health IT. Results of recent research as to the challenges that providers experience are outlined, and then several possible health IT interventions are profiled.

This resource is intended to aid providers and health IT implementers in identifying a leadership team for a successful EHR implementation.  Selecting the right people for an EHR implementation team is a critical step in a successful implementation. In general, members of the team should be enthusiastic, well-respected and forward thinking. Team members should bring differing perspectives on how the EHR will be used and provide a wide array of skills and knowledge. The size of a practice will determine the size of the implementation team. For smaller practices, one person may be managing several of the areas of responsibility included. 

This Data Dictionary provides a single point of reference for data mapping and interpretation for all of the indicators in your quality reports. Organization of the data definitions in this tool provides a reference for the team of all such definitions that impact reports and alerts in the analytics application.

Health centers are interested in using social determinants data to manage and improve the health of their patient population and community, and are at different places on the population health management (PHM) and social determinants of health (SDH) adoption curve. The Protocol for Responding to and Assessing Patients’ Assets, Risks, and Experiences (PRAPARE) is a national effort to help health centers and other providers collect the data needed to better understand and act on their patients’ social determinants of health. In this webinar, the Colorado Community Managed Care Network (CCMCN), a Health Center Controlled Network (HCCN) highlighted a Tableau data dashboard that they have developed to help their health centers make decisions on population health management. They discussed the rationale for developing the tool, challenges and facilitators to integration, and how their health centers benefit from data sharing across Tableau.

To ensure successful and smooth implementation or migration of electronic health record (EHR) systems, it is critical for health center staff to carefully plan the process. This timeline document highlights key events and milestones that should take place in the months before, and immediately following, the EHR go-live date.

Million Hearts^® EHR Optimization Guides help healthcare professionals leverage their EHR systems to excel in the ABCS. Through helpful step by step instructions, the Guides illustrate how providers can use their EHR products to find, use, and improve data on the Million Hearts^® clinical quality measures. Ultimately, these guides facilitate the identification of at-risk patients, helping clinical teams across the country protect their patients from heart attacks, strokes, and other cardiovascular events.

The first of a three-part EHR Optimization series focused on establishing goals and expectations for optimizing EHR utilization and sharing proven strategy/tools for optimizing EHR utilization, including slides and related tools. 

The third of a three-part EHR Optimization series focused on establishing goals and expectations for optimizing EHR utilization and sharing proven strategy/tools for optimizing EHR utilization, including slides and related tools. 

The second of a three-part EHR Optimization series focused on establishing goals and expectations for optimizing EHR utilization and sharing proven strategy/tools for optimizing EHR utilization, including slides and related tools.

During the 4^th quarter (October to December) of 2022, there are two major health information technology (HIT) requirement changes, with potential for significant implications to health centers. Read this FAQ to find out how your health center can respond.

Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) is an HL7® standard for electronic healthcare data exchange. This next generation exchange architecture is advancing interoperability in healthcare. FHIR provides a standard way to express and share information across health centers, providers, and related organizations independent of how local EHRs display or store data. For UDS+ and other information exchange needs, all health centers, PCAs, and HCCNs will want to be familiar with the basics of the HL7 FHIR standard. In this session we will discuss what FHIR is, what it basically does, how it impacts your EHR, and what it might mean to your health center and patients.

Health centers are having to dramatically change approaches to patient care as the COVID-19 public health emergency keeps patients at home and ramps up the demands of telehealth and other remote care modalities. This resource is a quick start guide for health centers making this change. 

Are you capturing information like immigration or refugee status, intimate partner violence, human trafficking, risk of acquiring HIV through sexual contact or substance use disorder, or other information that brings up questions about how to document or code while respecting the patient’s privacy?

This health center learning collaborative series presented health center case examples that explore the privacy and data sharing considerations of EHR documentation of sensitive patient information, such as social history and social risk, and encourage participants to discuss the implications for health centers and their patients. 

Are you capturing information like immigration or refugee status, intimate partner violence, human trafficking, risk of acquiring HIV through sexual contact or substance use disorder, or other information that brings up questions about how to document or code while respecting the patient’s privacy?

This health center learning collaborative series presented health center case examples that explored the privacy and data sharing considerations of EHR documentation of sensitive patient information, such as social history and social risk, and encouraged participants to discuss the implications for health centers and their patients. 

Are you capturing information like immigration or refugee status, intimate partner violence, human trafficking, risk of acquiring HIV through sexual contact or substance use disorder, or other information that brings up questions about how to document or code while respecting the patient’s privacy?

This health center learning collaborative series presented health center case examples that explored the privacy and data sharing considerations of EHR documentation of sensitive patient information, such as social history and social risk, and encouraged participants to discuss the implications for health centers and their patients. 

Are you capturing information like immigration or refugee status, intimate partner violence, human trafficking, risk of acquiring HIV through sexual contact or substance use disorder, or other information that brings up questions about how to document or code while respecting the patient’s privacy?

This health center learning collaborative series presented health center case examples that explored the privacy and data sharing considerations of EHR documentation of sensitive patient information, such as social history and social risk, and encouraged participants to discuss the implications for health centers and their patients. 

Are you capturing information like immigration or refugee status, intimate partner violence, human trafficking, risk of acquiring HIV through sexual contact or substance use disorder, or other information that brings up questions about how to document or code while respecting the patient’s privacy?

This health center learning collaborative series will present health center case examples that explore the privacy and data sharing considerations of EHR documentation of sensitive patient information, such as social history and social risk, and encourage participants to discuss the implications for health centers and their patients. 

The HITEQ Center has a number of EHR transition tools that may be helpful for health centers that are considering a transition from one EHR to another. This resource brings together all these tools for easy access.

HITEQ created this template to assist HCCNs, PCAs, or other organizations in conducting health IT assessments of multiple health centers. 

This toolkit provides a framework for Health Centers to evaluate compliance and security concerns as they purchase, adopt, and implement technology solutions.

In recent years, health centers have become increasingly interested in and charged with not only addressing the health concerns of their patients, but centering and responding to patient’s social needs. According to Healthy People 2030, social needs, also known as the social determinants of health, are the conditions in the environments where people live, learn, work, and play that affect a wide range of health, functioning, and quality-of-life outcomes and risks. Social needs encompass the quality of and access to resources such as housing, transportation, safety, employment, food, and more. Identifying and addressing unmet social needs as part of the clinical encounter provides the opportunity to deliver higher-quality, whole-person care, advance population health, and reduce healthcare costs.

Now more than ever, health centers know that addressing social determinants of health is key to ensuring patients from underserved and disadvantaged groups receive quality, informed, and comprehensive care. This resource explores how health centers can effectively and safely collect critical patient information, including sensitive information like social need screening, through digital patient intake solutions that rely on paper-free, data-smart registration and EHR integration. Health centers can walk through why adding these solutions to their clinics can engage rather than alienate patients, and how to implement these technologies to screen for social risk and improve the patient experience.

The resource is available in the Documents to Download section below.

The Performance Measure Data Definition Worksheet can be used during the Quality Improvement (QI) process to assess the alignment of your health center’s workflows and documentation and your EHR vendor’s reporting logic processes.
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) EHR Certification criteria requires EHR vendors to use eCQM (electronic Clinical Quality Measure) specifications to define measures. Therefore, reported data for a measure should be consistent regardless of EHR vendor. In practice, however, it is important to confirm that your EHR vendor’s reporting logic is consistent with your health center’s definition and workflows, and vice versa, as outlined in this worksheet.

This Report Inventory tool is a means to make public all available reports, the schedule for publishing to the organization, and their distribution.