If they haven't already, two words are about to become central to the vocabulary of many a health information professional: meaningful use. That's the standard that healthcare providers will have to meet to qualify for Medicare and Medicaid bonus payments for electronic health records starting in 2011, and the gears of government policymakers are hard at work to define meaningful use. You can be sure AHIMA will be educating its membership on this subject at the organization's annual conference.

Dan Rode, AHIMA's vice president of policy and government relations, gave some hints of what's to come. Speaking to an audience in Boston a couple of weeks ago, Rode noted that politics could play a huge role in the development of rules for meaningful use--potentially saddling providers with tough reporting requirements. "If these are the good goals, then how do we measure them and measure them in ways that don't become a burden themselves?" Rode asked, according to a report in Health Data Management.

Rode called for industrywide collaboration to ensure that HHS sets uniform standards, uniform quality measures and data policies that meet privacy requirements. Much collaboration and healthy discussion about meaningful use will be on display at AHIMA '09, including at a keynote session with national health IT coordinator Dr. David Blumenthal. On Monday, Oct. 5 at 4:45 p.m., W. Kelly McLendon, founder of HIM consultancy HIXperts--and a former AHIMA Visionary Award winner--presents on meaningful use, data exchange and the EHR. You also may be interested in a preconference session on Saturday, Oct. 3, at 2 p.m., on the subject of EMR-related compliance concerns, featuring a Kaiser Permanente Colorado physician coding expert.