Introduction

The mission of the CCHIT is to "accelerate the adoption of robust, interoperable health information technology by creating a credible, efficient certification process".

CCHIT is "an independent, 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with the public mission of accelerating the adoption of robust, interoperable health information technology" . CCHIT was founded by a consortium of academic and professional health information technology organizations [2]. CCHIT received extensive funding from the US Department of Health and Human Services to "develop and evaluate the certification criteria and inspection process for EMRs and the networks through which they operate".

To help physicians, hospitals and other providers understand the Certification Commission’s criteria for electronic health records (EHRs), the CCHIT makes available a Concise Guide to Certification, which provides a comparison to the Commission’s most recent criteria and demonstrates how certification of EHRs to these criteria ensures that they are a qualified electronic health record under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). The CCHIT criteria will be further adjusted to meet the final 2011 meaningful use objectives required by the US Dept of Health and Human Services (HHS) when the Office of the National Coordinator (ONC/HHS) publishes the criteria and standards needed to support those objectives.

The commission was established by America Health Information Management Association (AHIMA), The National Alliance for Health Information Health Technology, The Health Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS) in 2004 as a Limited Liability Corporation before becoming an independent self sustaining organization in 2007. The organization created the certification criteria through a consensus process of stakeholders from various clinical, technology, vendor, government and standards organizations.