"We are very concerned about the requirement that hospitals and eligible professionals must meet each and every one of the objectives to demonstrate meaningful use and thereby qualify for incentive payments," Dr. Lee said.
In her letter in response, which has not been made public, Ms. Sebelius dismissed the idea of suspending the incentive program, arguing that it "would be profoundly unfair to the hospitals and eligible professionals that have invested billions of dollars and devoted countless hours of work to purchase and install systems and educate staff".
The change in approach between the proposed and final rule was responsive to commenters' concerns that fewer than 5 quality measures would likely be reported by most eligible professionals, and that explicitly linking CDS requirements to clinical quality measures would "put constraints on providers and eliminate many types of CDS that could be beneficial".
In Australia and the United Kingdom, scientists must have 2 years of patent work experience to be eligible for professional registration.
Eligible health professional participants include nurses, physicians, dieticians, pharmacists, and social workers.
And at each study center simple random sampling was employed to select the eligible health professional for the interview.
Eligible healthcare professionals include: obstetricians, paediatricians, nurses (maternal/newborn), midwives, family physicians and genetics professionals.
The company announced last week that a forecasted 5,000 eligible medical professionals are using the EMR to qualify for up to $90 million in 2011 federal technology incentives.
Fifty-seven eligible healthcare professionals were identified and invited to take part.
