HIT Technical Capability: Given the analytic capability of the EHR as deployed within the clinical delivery system thus far in the project, if the lead clinician (CEO/CMO/clinic chief/owner) were to ask for clinical reports that would meet both the reporting and QI requirements for the project, what would be available? Either no report, or canned quarterly year-to-date reports limited to patients who have had an office visit during those time periods. Reports with a 12-month rolling look back limited to patients who have had an office visit during the same time period. Reports in which the denominator includes all active members of a target population within the panel or clinic regardless of whether they have been seen in the clinic, and the numerator includes patient-level data showing the most recent date and value in a rolling 12-month look back.
Available HIT skills: Given the staffing of the clinical site or delivery system thus far in the project, if the CEO/CMO were to have asked for clinical reports that would meet both the reporting and QI requirements for EvidenceNOW, was there someone available to respond to that request? No. There was no one in the clinic or in the delivery system with the skills to assure that available EHR features were optimized to modify data flow, and to build, run, and validate clinical quality reports. There was a role for such a person in the clinic, which may or may not have been filled or was done by a self-trained provider or “super-user”, but the ability to do that reliably was unstable due to turnover, other demands on that person’s time, or inadequate vendor support. The IT skills necessary for clinical quality reporting were available to the clinic in the form of a organized resource such as an “IT shop”, and there was a process in place to assure requests were completed including validation of custom clinical quality reports.