SYNDROMIC SURVEILLANCE PROGRAM

Declaration of Readiness Statement

(Posted January 30, 2024) The West Virginia Syndromic Surveillance Program will continue accepting syndromic surveillance registrations under the Promoting Interoperability Programs or the Quality Payment Program for the remainder of the 2024 reporting period and continuing with the 2025 reporting period. It is the registrant’s responsibility to know the requirements of the particular Federal Rule under which you are registering and reporting.

Eligibility Criteria

• Is the facility an eligible hospital (EH), critical access hospital (CAH), or an urgent care center with three or more EP/ECs?

• Does the facility have a certified Electronic Health Record (EHR) system? Contact your EHR vendor to determine if your system is or will be certified for syndromic surveillance reporting.

Registration

• If you meet both eligibility criteria, you must register your intent to report syndromic surveillance data using the Meaningful Use Registration System. Download the "Registration System Instructions" to assist with registering. Contact Jessica Hoffman if you have any questions while completing your registration. Please be aware of the following:

• IMPORTANT NOTE TO EPs/ECs: West Virginia is NOT accepting syndromic surveillance registrations from EPs/ECs unless the EP/EC practices in an urgent care setting. Only those EPs/ECs in an urgent care setting with THREE OR MORE EPs/ECs should register.

• If you are an urgent care center with three or more EPs/ECs, you are eligible to register, and you should enter one registration for the facility. Do not enter registrations for each EP/EC.

• If you previously registered for syndromic data reporting and your registration status was "In Review," "Registered - In Queue," "First or Second Invitation," "Testing and Validation Queue," or "Production" at the end of 2023, you do not have to register again. Your previous registration will continue in 2024.

• It is not the responsibility of the West Virginia syndromic surveillance team to know your certification status, your reporting period registration deadline, or whether your reporting period is the full 2024 calendar year or any 90-day period in 2024.

• After you submit your registration, the Registration Status will indicate "In Review" in the Meaningful Use Registration System, and your primary contact will receive an e-mail confirmation indicating that the registration was successfully saved.

• IMPORTANT NOTE: The facility is responsible for keeping their registration up to date and transferring login credentials in the case of staff turnover. The BPH is not able to alter registration or login information. The facility should also keep a record of all communications received from public health throughout the registration, onboarding, testing, and production process, as well as any other documentation that may be needed for attestation or auditing purposes. Examples may include e-mails, screen shots providing date of registration, acknowledgement letters, etc. Due to the large volume of registrants, public health programs will not have the capacity to prepare such a log on your behalf.

• The BPH encourages all providers and EHR vendors to coordinate with the West Virginia Health Information Exchange (HIE) to establish a connection to BioSense for secure data transmission. If a provider does not wish to establish a connection to the HIE, the provider should contact Jessica Hoffman for instructions to connect directly to BioSense.

Resources

• Please visit the websites for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid PI Programs​ and the Quality Payment Program​ for more information.
  
• BioSense ESSENCE quick start guide to using ESSENCE​
  

 

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