Author: NC Medicaid EHR Incentive Program NCMedicaid.HIT@dhhs.nc.gov
Program Year 2018 is now closed
The NC Medicaid EHR Incentive Program is no longer accepting Program Year 2018 attestations.
Program Year 2018 attestations are being processed in the order they were received.
Attestations received in April may take up to eight weeks to be processed from the date the signed attestation was received.
Eligible professionals (EP) may check the status of their attestation at any time on the Status Page on the NC Medicaid EHR Incentive Payment System (NC-MIPS).
NC-MIPS is Open for Program Year 2019
NC-MIPS is currently accepting Program Year 2019 Stage 3 Meaningful Use (MU) attestations.
All EPs attesting in Program Year 2019 will be required to attest to Stage 3 MU and use a 2015 Edition of certified EHR technology.
In Program Year 2019, EPs may continue to use a 90-day MU reporting period. The MU reporting period must be from calendar year 2019 and will be any continuous 90-day period in which an EP successfully demonstrates MU of certified EHR technology.
EPs who were paid for Program Year 2018 using a 90-day patient volume reporting period from calendar year 2018, have the option to use the same patient volume reporting period to attest for Program Year 2019.
CMS has updated its Promoting Interoperability Program website with Program Year 2019 information and details including the 2019 Medicaid Eligible Professional specification sheets.
The Two-Part Attestation Process
All EPs who have 90 days of MU objective data that meets CMS’ requirements may submit their demographic, license, patient volume and MU objective data in NC-MIPS beginning May 1, 2019.
In Program Year 2019, EPs who have successfully attested to MU in a previous program year will be required to use a full calendar year clinical quality measure (CQM) reporting period. Returning meaningful users who would like an early review of requirements, excluding CQMs, may submit their attestation in two parts. Part 1 of the attestation may be submitted now through Dec. 31, 2019.
The two-part attestation process does not increase or reduce the information being submitted but allows EPs to complete their attestation in a 12-month window instead of in four months. Submitting in two parts also allows ample time for EPs to address any attestation discrepancies. These EPs will return to NC-MIPS after Jan. 1, 2020 to submit their CQM data.
EPs who have only attested to adopt, implement, upgrade (AIU), may use a 90-day CQM reporting period and may submit a complete attestation in NC-MIPS beginning May 1, 2019.
EPs who attested in NC-MIPS in a previous year will be automatically directed to the appropriate page in NC-MIPS.
For more information on the two-part attestation process, please email NCMedicaid.HIT@dhhs.nc.gov.
Program Year 2019 Clinical Quality Measures
EPs are required to report on six of 50 CQMs. New in Program Year 2019, CMS is encouraging EPs to report at least one outcome measure and one high priority measure. If any outcome or high priority CQMs are relevant to the EP’s scope of practice, those should be reported first. If there are no outcome and/or high priority CQMs that are relevant to the EP’s scope of practice, the EP may choose to report on any other six CQMs.
Program Year 2019 clinical quality measures are available for review on the eCQI website.
General Reminders
EPs who attested with another state should email NCMedicaid.HIT@dhhs.nc.gov prior to attesting with North Carolina for Program Year 2019.
For those practices unsure if a new provider may participate in the NC Medicaid EHR Incentive Program in Program Year 2019, please email the EP’s NPI to NCMedicaid.HIT@dhhs.nc.gov and program staff will determine if the provider previously attested with another practice.