AUSTIN, TX – Officials of the Drummond Group, Inc., an Austin, Texas-based interoperability test lab, say the company hopes to extend its testing program to electronic health records.

The company is planning to apply to become a certifying body when the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) releases its requirements for certifying bodies for EHRs.

The sole approved EHR certification agency is the private, nonprofit Certification Commission for Health Information Technology, but the ONC plans to expand the number of EHR certification entities to support its new policies on meaningful use of EHRs.

At the American Health Information management Association’s 2009 convention in October when CCHIT Chairman, Mark Leavitt, MD, was asked if CCHIT anticipated any competition, he said, “It’s not clear to me why others would want to do it. We’re a mission-driven organization, so it’s not a competition thing.”

Rick Drummond, CEO of the Drummond Group says, “Clearly there is a growing demand for EHR certifications. Drummond Group has certified over a thousand products in a variety of standards and industries. Our test processes have been proven, and we have testing experience with standards that address user identity, data security and system interoperability.”

The company has worked with the CDC, the U.S. General Services Administration and the Drug Enforcement Administration, Drummond said.

“Drummond Group (according to its Web site) is all about outcomes and results, so their approach is more in line philosophically with what ONC has in mind, says Glenn Laffel, MD, vice president, clinical affairs for San Francisco-based Practice Fusion, a provider of Web-based EHRs. “Plus they’ve done a lot of work with interoperability and Web-based certifications, which is not CCHIT’s strong suit,” he added.

Laffel said he hoped Drummond’s announcement would “encourage other entities to take the plunge as well, not to mention motivate ONC to release criteria it will use to select the outsourced providers of certifying services.”

David C. Kibbe MD, a physician and senior adviser to the American Academy of Family Physicians, said he doubts that CCHIT will remain the only organization in this space. Kibbe said two other big companies, which he declined to name, have expressed interest.
“Other organizations that might be able to do this are the Medical Group Management Association, the National Committee for Quality Assurance and the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations,” Laffel said.