CMS on June 23 unveiled the Office of Burden and Health Informatics, which will bridge tech and innovation initiatives with the agency's efforts to reduce regulatory and administrative burdens for providers and beneficiaries.
"Specifically, the work of this new office will be targeted to help reduce unnecessary burden, increase efficiencies, continue administrative simplification, increase the use of health informatics, and improve the beneficiary experience," CMS Administrator Seema Verma said in a news release.
Five details:
1. The new office stems from CMS' Patients over Paperwork initiative, which aims to reduce unnecessary regulatory burden and allow providers to spend more time on patient care.
2. Since launching three years ago, the PoP initiative has removed unnecessary conditions of participation for hospitals and other providers and also created a consolidated data submission experience for different categories of the Merit-based Incentive Payment System so clinicians no longer have to submit data in multiple systems.
3. The new office will focus on strengthening CMS' efforts across Medicare, Medicaid, the Children's Health Insurance Program and the Health Insurance Marketplace to reduce hours and costs that clinicians and providers generate for CMS-mandated compliance.
4. The division will also increase the number of clinicians, providers and health plans CMS works with to ensure the agency has a better understanding of how various regulatory burdens may affect healthcare delivery.
5. Health informatics, or using and applying health and clinical data to provide better care for patients, will be another focus of the office. OBHI will spearhead innovation efforts through interoperability projects and create new tools that allow patients to carry their personal health data with them privately and securely throughout the healthcare system.