Hospital Meaningful Use Incentive Dollars and HIT-Related Capital Expenditures

Abstract

Hospital Meaningful Use incentives were positively correlated with health information technology-related capital expenditures.

Take-Away Points:

• No other known research has demonstrated a relationship between the Hospital MU incentive program and HIT-related capital expenditures.
• Our main finding that showed a positive correlation between MU incentives and HIT-related capex may provide some support for policy-makers evaluating the effectiveness of the MU incentive program to stimulate HIT-related capital investments at hospitals and offset some of those hospital costs.
• Our second most important finding that demonstrated hospital executives increased and then decreased HIT-capital spending as the MU incentive dollars increased and then decreased highlights a need to understand whether the MU incentives appropriately prepared hospitals for EHR adoption.

NOTE:

Funding Sources: This publication was supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as part of the National Telehealth Center of Excellence Awards (U66 RH31458 – MUSC; U66RH31459 – UMMC). The contents are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement, by HRSA, HHS or the U.S. Government.

This publication was also partially supported by the South Carolina Clinical & Translational Research (SCTR) Institute, with an academic home at the Medical University of South Carolina, through NIH - NCATS Grant Number UL1 TR001450. Data analytic support for the study was provided through support for the CEDAR core funded by the MUSC Office of the Provost.