How does the stimulus package affect medical group practices?
printer-friendly PDF President Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 into law on February 17. Popularly known as the stimulus package, it provides $787 billion in new spending and tax cuts. Many provisions affect health care. Physicians, hospitals and others treating Medicare and Medicaid patients will be eligible for billions of dollars in incentive payments to adopt health information technology (HIT). Details will have to be defined through federal regulation, but here’s the bottom line for physicians in medical group practices qualifying for the Medicare electronic health record (EHR) incentive: each qualifying physician in your medical group can be reimbursed up to $44,000 for adopting a certified EHR. How will my practice receive the EHR stimulus funding? The government has not finalized the timing and distribution method for the incentive payments. As details of the program are released, MGMA will communicate them to members through MGMA Washington Conn
