CCHIT Approves New Criteria for Ambulatory EHR Certification

The Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology, or CCHIT, recently announced unanimous approval of new criteria for office-based electronic health records, or EHRs. The criteria will go into effect on May 1.

In a March 14 press release, CCHIT listed the newly approved key criteria for choosing an EHR system that are important to family physicians, including

"These latest materials show not only the concrete progress made during the past year, but also the path forward toward more complete interoperability of EHRs and health information networks in the years ahead," said Mark Leavitt, M.D., Ph.D., chair of CCHIT.

The federal government recognizes CCHIT, an independent, nonprofit organization, as an official certification body for EHR products. Health IT vendors whose products meet CCHIT standards can label their products as "CCHIT Certified." To date, nearly 60 EHR products are listed as certified on CCHIT's Web site.