Medicare or Medicaid incentives--your choice

While the health IT stimulus package has been finalized on Capitol Hill, there's at least one major wrinkle involved in how it impacts providers. It appears that physicians will have to choose whether to receive Medicare or Medicaid incentives for using health IT, according to one attorney who has analyzed the law.

The stimulus package includes $17.2 billion in Medicare and Medicaid incentives for physicians hospitals using qualifying EMR systems.

Speaking at a HIMSS web seminar on Wednesday, partner Heidi Echols of Chicago law firm McDermott, Will & Emery, said she'd concluded that physicians can't get incentives from both programs under the stimulus. And while acute care hospitals can apply for both types of incentives, children's hospitals cannot.

To get Medicare incentives, health care providers must already have an ER in place. However, doctors can get up to $25,000 in year-one Medicaid incentive payments to offset some of the cost of buying the technology. After getting that funding, physicians will be able to get up to $10,000 annually for four more years to support "meaningful use" of EMRs, she said.

To get more information on these incentive options:
- read this iHeathBeat piece

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