In a move that could boost adoption of electronic health records (EHRs), the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has issued a memorandum stating that nonprofit hospitals can offer subsidies to affiliated physicians to buy EHR software without jeopardizing their nonprofit status.
The memo is a follow-up to regulations issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on August 8, 2006, regarding hospital EHR software subsidies. Many hospitals believe their medical staff physicians need financial incentives to acquire and implement EHR software, the IRS said, and the rules issued last year provided guidelines to allow hospitals to do so without violating federal antikickback and self-referral laws.
The new IRS memo states that the agency will not consider EHR subsidies to be a violation of the 501(c)(3) section of the IRS code governing nonprofits, as long as certain criteria are met:
- The subsidies must comply with the HHS guidelines on EHR subsidies issued last year.
- The hospital providing the subsidy must be able to access the EHR data created by the physician using the software.
- The EHR data must be accessible by all the medical staff of the hospital.
- The hospital provides the same level of subsidy to all its medical staff physicians, or varies the level of subsidy by applying valid criteria.
By AuntMinnie.com staff writers
May 14, 2007
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