The Electronic Healthcare Network Accreditation Commission (EHNAC), a non-profit standards development organization and accrediting body, located in Farmington, CT, has announced the development of a new accreditation program offering targeted to application service providers for electronic health records (EHRs).

According to a press release, the Application Service Provider Accreditation Program for Electronic Health Records (ASPAP-EHR) will evaluate companies providing Application Service Provider-format EHRs against specific criteria in areas of privacy and confidentiality, technical performance, business processes, resources and security.

EHNAC plans to start beta testing of the new ASPAP-EHR accreditation program this summer and is currently seeking qualified organizations interested in participating as beta testing sites for the ASPAP-EHR program and its health information exchange accreditation program (HIEAP). The HIEAP is designed for regional health information organizations, community health data/network partnerships and other groups. This program assesses privacy policies, security, technical performance, business practices and organizational resources. The new programs are scheduled to fully launch in Jan. 2010 after the beta testing process is complete and criteria versions have been adopted.

"With the swiftly-emerging legislation developments such as the HITECH Act and the calling for authoritative standards and regulations from various leaders at both the federal and state levels, there is a great sense of urgency for EHNAC to put a strong emphasis on addressing much-needed accreditation standards to ensure compliance and accountability," says Lee Barrett, executive director of EHNAC. "Our overarching goals are to improve transactional quality, operational efficiency and data security throughout all sectors that handle protected health information, and we anticipate our new programs will provide a greater level of confidence to all interacting parties at a time when the spotlight is truly upon them."

EHNAC says companies interested in participating in beta testing should visit the EHNAC Web site to review the draft criteria of the proposed accreditation program and if interested in participating contact EHNAC. The draft criteria sets for both programs will be available online at www.ehnac.org for public review. There will be opportunity to provide opinions, comments and suggestions of the new program criteria versions proposed for adoption. This period will last 60 days, and should commence on Aug. 14, 2009 and ending on Oct. 12, 2009.

Source: EHNAC.