CORAL SPRINGS, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Point-of-Care Partners (POCP), a national health information technology (HIT) strategy and management consulting firm, has been chosen to provide its “ePrescribing State Law Review” services to athenahealth, Inc. (NASDAQ:ATHN), a leading provider of network-enabled services and point-of-care mobile applications for hospital and ambulatory providers nationwide. Through its Regulatory Resource Center, POCP helps electronic health record (EHR) companies ensure that their EHR platforms are compliant with state and federal regulations governing electronic prescribing.
The methods in which medications are prescribed, dispensed, and administered in the United States are rapidly changing, due in part to the nation’s opioid epidemic. States are racing to legislate potential solutions to curb opiate abuse and reduce deaths by overdose. Many of these solutions have significant impact to EHR platforms for ePrescribing. Since January of this year, seventeen states have enacted laws related to opiate prescriptions and prescription drug monitoring programs (PDMPs). These statutes are requiring providers to review state PDMP data prior to prescribing, implementing limits to the quantity of controlled substances prescribed, and mandating ePrescribing for controlled substances. Our video, “EHR Trends: Integrated PDMPs,” available here provides additional insights about these trends.
“Regulations in general about electronic prescribing vary from state to state and require constant monitoring due to changes that get proposed or enacted. Both the opiate crisis and the increasing use of specialty and biosimilar drugs are only making it more complex,” said Tony Schueth, CEO and Managing Partner at POCP. “All these mandates are focused on delivering the right information to the point of care and require EHR and electronic prescribing companies to accommodate new forms of communication between prescribers, pharmacies, Prescription Drug Monitoring Programs and other organizations.”
The ePrescribing State Law Review, a subscription-based consulting service, combines access to POCP regulatory experts with timely analyses of evolving laws and regulations governing electronic prescriptions. athenahealth joins other organizations including Cerner, NextGen and Practice Fusion in leveraging POCP’s regulatory team and its ePrescribing State Law Review for monitoring emerging regulations impacting the prescribing of medications in the U.S.
About Point-of-Care Partners
Point-of-Care Partners is a HIT management consulting firm with in-depth expertise in ePrescribing, eMedication management, health information exchange, accountable care organizations, multi-stakeholder initiatives and other programs requiring HIT project management.
