I’ve discussed a lot of problems (there are many) with the CCHIT EHR Certification in the past. However, one problem I’d never heard of was something that Lourdes from WebDMEMR said in a comment on my post about EHR certification recommendations:

WebDMEMR’s development schedule has been on par with the Meaningful Use Matrix Tagged for CCHIT Reference. This document lays out a generalized view of the functionality necessary to conform with meaningful use, not CCHIT. I actually took a look at the Preliminary ARRA criteria, can believe that there are some criteria that only apply to client-server EMRs? With no option for web based applications? These test scripts are geared towards client – server based technologies, I found that many of the criterion did not make sense for a web based EMR. For example, I noticed one requirement states that the technology must use Kerberos. This is technology is only primarily available and necessary for client – server based EMRs. Representing a web based company, how are we supposed test ourselves if the test scripts are based on the wrong technology? CCHIT’s answer was: the federal governement imposed that criteria.. we have no say in that.. I highly doubt the federal government would restrict all other emr technologies.. CCHIT is incompenent, and are playing on the EMR communities fears. I definitely will not buy into it.

The problem of having a criteria that only applies to a client server based EMR is a pretty serious problem since so many EMR these days are web based and wouldn’t need or want to use Kerberos. CCHIT should really find a way to deal with this problem. Issues like this could also be a problem for the HHS criteria, so it will be interesting to see if HHS can do a better job than CCHIT has done.