Meaningful Use and CKM

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Meaningful Use: What Is It?

• By definition, meaningful use refers to the use of certified electronic health record technology to perform certain tasks.
• Meaningful Use Stage I is ultimately an outline for better and more affordable healthcare
• While not yet established, it is hoped that Stage II and III will complete the first chapters of better and more affordable healthcare
• Meaningful Use is an important infrastructure for improving healthcare
• Meaningful Use limits its focus to using technology

 Meaningful Use: What Isn't It?

• Meaningful Use is not a comprehensive plan to leverage technology for healthcare improvement
• Meaningful Use is not focused on the use of data
• Meaningful Use is not Clinical Knowledge Management

Meaningful Use and Clinical Knowledge Management

Meaningful Use is focused on the collection, storage, and reporting of data, not the creation of actionable knowledge. While MU creates outlines, paragraphs, and chapters in data collection, Clinical Knowledge Management creates volumes of knowledge to improve all aspects of healthcare. These volumes of knowledge are needed if we are ever going to bend the cost curve in the US healthcare system. 

MU needs to be built with this end in mind; if we don't take this opportunity to build the necessary infrastructure, we will not be able to generate the knowledge needed to make a sustainable US healthcare system. The conversations about MU need to expand beyond implementation dates, reimbursement, and vendor/physician concerns. We need to include discussions about which data needs to be captured to insure the generation of sufficient knowledge to allow optimal return from the investment in Meaningful Use.