Given pressure on vendors to re-certify early and often, it's definitely a good sign that the Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology (CCHIT) is rolling out plans to make EMR certifications simpler. CCHIT is now working with the MITRE Corp. on an open source software-testing framework, dubbed LAIKA, which will let vendors test and verify on their own whether their products meet CCHIT standards. The software, which will be distributed by Apache 2.0, should be be available at no charge as of March 21.
With HHS's demanding that re-certifications take place every 12 months to meet its safe harbor rules, vendors have been in a quandary, as they typically only do upgrades every 18 to 24 months. The new tool won't change the vendors' development cycle, but it will help them determine where they stand and possibly take steps to meet standards on the revolving 12 month schedule HHS has set. All in all, while this won't be a cure all, it can't be a bad thing either.
To find out more about the new software:
- read this Healthcare IT News article
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