As the nation's largest health information network, the Surescripts Network Alliance connects an array of participants from across the healthcare marketplace that's unprecedented in both size and scope. Combined with our broad portfolio of solutions, these connections put us in a unique position to effectively enhance prescribing, inform care decisions and advance healthcare for all.In addition to our solutions, participants access three core elements unique to the Surescripts Network Alliance: our Intelligence Enablers, our Trust, Quality & Reliability initiatives and our Governance best practices. Enhances prescribing by collectively enabling safer and more affordable prescriptions. Surescripts informs care decisions by arming healthcare professionals with actionable patient intelligence. We are taking action against this public health crisis through a combination of technology, education and public policy.Several Surescripts solutions can directly enhance prescribing and inform care decisions around opioids to help curb fraud and abuse. Customers can access complete medication histories from within the e-prescribing workflow to spot any medications that could adversely interact with a new opioid prescription.
Section 3302 Article 33 New York Public Health Law defines a prescription to include an “electronic” prescription. It further defines an electronic prescription as a prescription issued with an electronic signature and transmitted by electronic means in accordance with the appropriate regulations. You Can Now 3D Print Prescription Drugs FDA approval of the first 3D printed drug further shows the direction healthcare is heading. Samadi. 08/12/15 12:26pm.
Helps prescribers quickly identify any care patterns that might impact the decision to prescribe opioids, while lets them contact other clinicians for more information on any red flags they observe.Once a prescriber decides opioids are the right treatment option, eliminates opportunities to alter or divert a paper prescription. And once the patient leaves the office, can help monitor that the prescription is being filled as intended.for the latest news on our ongoing efforts to combat opioid abuse, including research and federal and state advocacy.
The Surescripts Network Alliance continuously works to improve data quality for the benefit of every pharmacist, prescriber and patient.monitors and analyzes the electronic prescriptions that cross our network and identifies opportunities to improve their accuracy. In 2017, we measured a by optimizing the e-prescribing process across five key elements: Drug Description, Representative National Drug Code (NDC), RxNorm, Structured and Codified Sig and Potency Unit Code. We also launched the, which recognizes EHRs and health systems contracted with Surescripts that have taken meaningful steps to improve e-prescription accuracy.See our for updates on our work to improve prescription accuracy. A truly interoperable network is required to provide actionable patient intelligence that leads to better healthcare decisions.
Accordingly, interoperability is a major focus for Surescripts. We started with, but today our entire portfolio of solutions supports the interoperability goals of the nation. Among other interoperability initiatives, Surescripts is a founding member of the Sequoia Project’s Carequality collaborative and DirectTrust, which supports secure, interoperable health information exchange via the Direct message protocols.See our for news on our interoperability efforts. Surescripts stores basic demographic information, provided by healthcare providers, for purposes of patient matching and identification. Patient demographics include:. Patient ID / Medical Record Number.
Patient name: First, middle, last, prefix, suffix. Patient Address line 1 & 2. Patient city, state, zip.
Patient date of birth. Patient genderIf a patient has chosen to opt-out of Surescripts Record Locator & Exchange, this demographic information will still be stored in the Surescripts database in order to ensure information is not exchanged.Surescripts does not store clinical records. Clinical records are stored and maintained by healthcare providers.
Surescripts simply provides secure electronic transmission of records between providers. To learn more about how Surescripts protects and uses information, please visit our. During the admission process, patient consent and HIPAA notification are standard processes, especially for purposes of treatment, healthcare operations, or payment. All queries and responses are made automatically through secured system to system communications. The response is returned to a patient record in a clinical setting and role based security determines which personnel have access to the information. Surescripts also contractually requires all certified software vendors to follow local, state and federal level privacy and security requirements. Many state-supported e-prescribing pilot programs are designed to help contain the rising costs of state-funded Medicaid programs.
Other state initiatives focus more broadly on developing programs to accelerate the adoption of e-prescribing and EHRs and models to leverage regional health information organizations (RHIOs).E-prescribing is generally addressed in two different ways on the state level. First, via a targeted approach where legislation provides incentives for adoption and use of e-prescribing, or creating demonstration projects to assess the financial and efficiency gains of e-prescribing. Second, legislative approaches sometimes roll e-prescribing requirements into larger health reform bills.Surescripts can help support your efforts to promote e-prescribing with important data and information for presentations. To request more information. Surescripts has more than a decade of experience developing a nationwide network to enable electronic prescribing and facilitate the secure exchange of health information. Through the Surescripts network, doctors, nurses, pharmacists and others can communicate with each other like a team, sharing information to reduce errors, improve efficiency, and save money.Today, Surescripts connects nearly 1 million healthcare professionals, more than 3,000 hospitals, and more than 700 software applications, providing the ability to exchange critical information on more than 230 million patients. Surescripts is uniquely positioned to leverage our assets and extract more value from our network to improve the patient and provider experience.
We’re using our unique experience as the nation’s e-prescription network® and building on it to exchange massive amounts of health information, including medication histories, prior authorizations and other complex clinical messages. The NCPDP SCRIPT Standard is the electronic prescribing (e-prescribing) standard created to facilitate the transfer of prescription data between pharmacies, prescribers, intermediaries, facilities, and payers.The current version of the standard, NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v10.6, is being replaced by the updated standard version, NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v2017071.
This updated standard version was adopted by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on April 16, 2018 (the published Final Rule date) as the official Medicare Part D prescription drug benefit e-prescribing standard.The updated NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v2017071 has a CMS implementation date of January 1, 2020 while the current NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v10.6 has a CMS sunset date of December 31, 2019.Visit our for updates on NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v2017071. The NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v2017071 materials are available to NCPDP members on the NCPDP website’s SCRIPT Standards page:Materials include:. NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v2017071 XML Files.
NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v2017071 Implementation Guide. NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v2017071 XML Standard. V2017071 NCPDP SCRIPT Standard Examples Guide. NCPDP SCRIPT 2017071 and 10.6 Comparison. NCPDP SCRIPT v2017071 Data Dictionary and External Code List (online tool). SCRIPT Implementation Recommendation GuideVisit our for updates on NCPDP SCRIPT Standard v2017071.
Whether registering a prescriber for the first time or updating an existing prescriber listing, directory listings are a shared resource on the Surescripts network and it is very important that listings remain consistent and accurate. Our experience with directory management has shown that when information is incorrect, this can lead to future problems experienced by both the prescriber and pharmacies they wish to communicate with such has faxed refill renewal requests and misrouted prescriptions. The following is a best practice approach to properly registering a prescriber within the Surescripts Admin Console to participate in e-prescribing.Most importantly, Surescripts recommends that the prescriber name be represented as it would in a legal or contract style document. Surescripts currently uses the NPI Registry through NPPES to review, and in questions of discrepancy, be the bases of the directory listing. Surescripts also recommends the address utilize the USPS standard address.Available fields and descriptions:(.) Represents those that are REQUIRED fields. To access Surescripts’ services, a prescriber, pharmacy and PBM must use software that has completed the Surescripts certification process.
This process validates that the software is able to send and receive electronic messages in accordance with industry standards and that it is providing open choice for medication selection and dispensing location.Surescripts certifies software used by prescribers, pharmacies and payers/PBMs for access to three core services: Prescription Benefit, Medication History and Prescription Routing. Starting in 2009, Surescripts also introduced a Clinical Messaging service, allowing clinical information to be exchanged between healthcare clinics and physicians.Certification concentrates on message format and workflow. The software vendor seeking certification is responsible for modifying/building the electronic prescribing application in accordance with the Surescripts Implementation Guides and qualitative requirements. Surescripts provides documentation and testing tools for the software vendor and conducts certification to ensure all the requirements are met. The software vendor is responsible for development, testing, and QA of its application. Identity proofing, also known as ID proofing, is the process of verifying that a person is who he or she claims to be.
ID proofing is a common practice across industries, including such common tasks as renewing a driver's license, securing new employment, or opening a bank account. There are varying methods for ensuring a person's identity and how much confidence (or assurance) one can place in the identity proofing process. The more robust the process, the greater assurance there is that the person is who they claim to be.
Government and other parties have set four levels of assurance, Assurance Levels 1, 2, 3 and 4, developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology.While there is no single standard for ID proofing for e-prescribing, Surescripts encourages all EHR vendors to target at least Assurance Level 2 and consider industry best practices to ensure the security of all participants on our network.Surescripts does not dictate the mechanism or manner by which EHR vendors and aggregators choose to implement identity proofing processes that best suit their business model. Physicians interested in e-prescribing must use e-prescribing software or an Electronic Health Record (EHR) that has been certified to connect to the Surescripts network.If your practice already has an EHR system, it is likely that your system has been certified by Surescripts. You simply need to contact your vendor representative and ask about getting connected to the Surescripts network.If you do not yet have an EHR or e-prescribing software in your practice, you will need to acquire a solution that fits your practice needs. A comprehensive list of e-prescribing technologies that have been certified by Surescripts is available on our. There are no transaction fees for prescribers to access or use the networking services provided by Surescripts.However, prescribers must use an electronic prescribing system that is certified to connect to the Surescripts network before they can send and receive prescription information.
A practice may be using a certified application already or it may need to acquire a new certified application. Costs for these systems are set by the companies that provide them. Systems that are certified to connect to the Surescripts network range from simple electronic prescribing software to full-featured EMR systems.The only time your practice would incur transaction fees for e-prescribing would be if the vendor you select charged your practice a transaction fee. Most vendors do not charge practices a transaction fee, but be sure to ask your potential vendors about this during system selection.Prescribers can check to see if their electronic prescribing system is certified.
You can search for e-prescribing enabled pharmacies by using the search feature located at the top of every page on our website. If a pharmacy that you are you are not able to locate within your e-prescribing/EHR application is listed as enabled for e-prescribing on the Surescripts website, this may indicate that your pharmacy directory is incomplete or outdated.We recommend that all certified vendors pull partial directory updates on a nightly basis from Surescripts and provide these updates to their customers with 24 hours. Vendors should also pull a complete directory update at least once per week and provide this data to their customers within 24 hours.Once the vendor has pulled a directory update from Surescripts they may automatically push the update to their customer or may require the customer to obtain the updated directory information. Please work with your e-prescribing/EHR vendor to understand how pharmacy directory updates are received into your e-prescribing/EHR application. Yes - although this process can make it difficult for pharmacies to match the new prescription order to the original request. As a result the pharmacy may send a duplicate renewal request or follow-up with a phone call to your office to ensure that the request is responded to. To prevent this from happening, please place a note on your new e-prescription that states that the prescription is a response to a separate renewal request and include the original prescription number.
E.g.) 'Relates to Rx#123456' or 'Relates to faxed Rx#123456'Remember, any request for a controlled substance must be responded to in accordance with DEA requirements. And, if you feel that you are getting a significant number of faxed requests from pharmacies that should be sending them to your practice electronically, please report them to your vendor. Although in most circumstances electronic prescribing can replace voice and paper-based communications with a totally electronic process, there are exceptions.1. Have you sent at least 5 new prescriptions electronically?Pharmacies will begin sending refill requests electronically once a prescriber sends at least five new prescriptions electronically via the Surescripts network.
This is to help ensure that your practice has been trained on your e-prescribing orEMRsystem and is ready to receive and respond to refill requests electronically.Additionally, the pharmacies need time to update their prescriber directories once they recognize that you are using your system to send new prescriptions electronically. The amount of time varies by pharmacy.2.
Is the pharmacy that faxed the refill request enabled for e-prescribing?More than 91% of the nation's pharmacies are enabled for e-prescribing. However, pharmacies that are not yet enabled for e-prescribing will continue to fax refill requests to you. You can search for e-prescribing enabled pharmacies by using the search feature located at the top of every page on our web site.3. Is the renewal request from a mail order pharmacy?Although six of the largest mail order pharmacies are connected to the Surescripts network, not all e-prescribing software vendors are certified to process prescription renewal requests electronically from mail-order pharmacies.
You can search for e-prescribing enabled pharmacies by using the search feature located at the top of every page on our web site.4. Have you been responding to renewal requests within the last 24 hours?To help ensure that patients' refill requests are processed in a timely manner, some pharmacies will automatically fax a duplicate refill request if they do not hear back from you within 24 hours.5. Is your demographic information complete in the Surescripts Directory?Pharmacies rely on the Surescripts directory to identify various locations where prescribers can receive Electronic Renewal Requests. If your information is incomplete or does not include all physical address locations at which you can receive renewals, pharmacies may assume you cannot e-prescribe, or cannot e-prescribe at that location, and will therefore send you a fax.
Surescripts provides an that you can utilize to review your information. Your prescriber record should match the information found on your prescription forms. If it does not match, please contact your e-prescribing or EMR technology vendor to have this information corrected through your normal support desk process.Finally, there is the chance that your individual prescriber record did not get updated correctly in the pharmacies' systems. This should be reported to your e-prescribing/EMR software vendor as soon as possible so that the pharmacies can be contacted and the problem can be investigated. Be prepared to provide specific examples of the faxed renewal requests so a support ticket can be generated for proper research and resolution at the pharmacy level. Although the vast majority of e-prescriptions are dispensed without incident, issues such as mishandled prescriptions may occur from time to time.Possible Causes:. A technical issue with your electronic prescribing software, the pharmacy computer system, or network connectivity may have caused you to receive an error message on the prescription's transmission.
The prescription may have arrived to the pharmacy's fax machine instead of their computer. Reasons can include the medication being a controlled substance, a temporary loss of network connectivity, or the fact that the pharmacy is not yet enabled for e-prescribing.
The prescription may have been successfully received but put 'on hold' due to an out-of-stock medication, an interruption during dispensing, or other issue. If an electronic prescription is sent to a pharmacy that is not setup for e-prescribing, the Rx will automatically be sent by fax to the pharmacy if your EHR vendor subscribes to the Surescripts fax directory (please check with your vendor to see if they subscribe). For all others circumstances, and dependent upon the urgency of the Rx, we suggest calling the pharmacy and arranging an alternate process for sending the Rx.We strongly advise you to contact/log a case with your prescriber technology/EHR vendor to report these errors and follow-up to ensure they’re resolved. For patients, an important advantage of a prescription being sent electronically is that the message is already formatted in such a way that the pharmacy computer can assimilate the information for rapid dispensing.
You also have the comfort of knowing that an accurate, legible prescription will arrive at the pharmacy and that it won't get lost, misplaced, destroyed or forgotten by the patient. Plus, patients can avoid making one trip to the pharmacy to drop off a prescription and another to pick it up. Surescripts has enabled a new message type called Rx Change (RXCHG) that allows the pharmacy to send a message electronically to a prescriber to request authorization to make a change to a prescription. This is a feature that is part of a new version of the electronic prescribing standard created by NCPDP.
Reach out to your e-prescribing/EHR software vendor for information with respect to the NCPDP SCRIPT 10.6 implementation/certification and ask if their software supports the Rx Change transaction. Surescripts has enabled a new message type called Cancel (CANRX) that allows the prescriber to send a message electronically to a pharmacy to cancel therapy on a previously prescribed medication or prescription. This feature is part of a new version of the electronic prescribing standard created by NCPDP. Reach out to your EHR vendor for information on their status with respect to 'NCPDP SCRIPT 10.6 implementation/certification'.
You should also check with your software vendor to see if your system is capable of receiving and processing Cancel transactions. Surescripts does not develop, sell or endorse e-prescribing software but instead works with existing vendors to certify their technologies to connect to the Surescripts network. This process ensures that electronic prescribing solutions are able to send and receive supported electronic messages and that the solution is providing open choice for medication selection and dispensing location.
Additionally, the process ensures that the technology systems work in accordance with industry-accepted standards for the electronic exchange of prescription data between physicians and pharmacies.A complete list of certified pharmacy software systems can be found at the following. If your pharmacy software is on this list and you are not yet enabled for e-prescribing, contact your vendor to request the e-prescribing functionality. In order for a pharmacy or DME company to be connected for e-prescribing you must be using a certified pharmacy management system. To see if your system has already completed certification with Surescripts.
If you are already using a certified software system please contact your vendor for further information on becoming enabled for e-prescribing. If your software vendor is not yet certified, please contact them directly regarding their plans to become certified and allow their pharmacy customers to connect for e-prescribing.about how Surescripts is serving the Long Term Care market. If your pharmacy management system is to connect to the Surescripts network, you simply contact your pharmacy software vendor, ask them to enable your e-prescribing functionality, and specify that you want to be connected to the Surescripts network.Pharmacies should ask their vendor:. If any patches or upgrades to their system are required. If any amendments to their contract are needed to cover transaction fees. What training is provided to get accustomed to the new or upgraded systemto see if your pharmacy software system has been certified by Surescripts.
Your connection to the Surescripts network enables you to:. receive new prescriptions. send requests for prescription renewals. receive renewal approval or denial responses from prescribers. receive new.
receive 'cancel' transactions (CANRX) from prescribers. send 'change' transactions (RxCHANGE) to prescribers.This functionality may not be available in all pharmacy software applications. Please contact your pharmacy software vendor to ensure they are certified for and have implemented these transaction types. You may also need to update your software to ensure that your pharmacy management system is capable of these transactions. In order for a pharmacy to send a refill request electronically to a prescriber, the pharmacy must have the individual prescriber's SPI number matched correctly within their pharmacy management system.
If a prescriber contacts you stating that renewal requests from your store are arriving by fax, you likely need to update that prescriber's information in your database. For a complete list of enabled prescribers and their SPI information please visit. Contact your chain headquarters' support desk to have the system updated to generate refill requests electronically to these prescribers.
If you believe you have received inappropriate duplicate messages you will need to contact your vendor to determine their policy on how to report this issue and how to request a refund. Most vendors require documentation, so please be prepared to provide the specific occurrences of these duplicate messages for any reporting and/or research to take place. Surescripts will work with your vendor to determine why the duplicate messages occurred and to determine if a refund to your vendor is warranted. Any potential refunds to your pharmacy will be provided directly by your vendor - not by Surescripts. This indicates that the prescriber you are attempting to send to does not accept renewal requests.
They only have the ability to transmit new prescriptions to your pharmacy. This could also be caused by attempting to transmit a renewal request to an outdated prescriber SPI number. Your pharmacy management system vendor is responsible for providing you with the necessary tools and training to maintain your prescriber directory and allow you to differentiate those prescribers that accept electronic renewal requests and those that do not accept them. If you think you have inaccurate information in your directories please contact your vendor.Surescripts also maintains a list of e-prescribing enabled physicians and their corresponding SPI information for those that accept renewal requests at www.surescripts.com/SPI. This as a supplemental resource you can utilize along with the tools provided by your vendor to assist in maintaining your prescriber directory.Note: When viewing the report on the Surescripts website, those prescribers that do not accept renewal requests are listed at the bottom of the report by name only. The pharmacy does not need the prescriber's SPI number loaded into their system to receive new prescriptions.
The SPI is only needed to transmit renewal requests electronically. When a prescriber responds to a refill request he may change the following fields: number of refills, written date, notes in the response segment, and substitution. However, if the prescriber needs to make any other changes, a new prescription must be written. The 'Denied, New to Follow' (DNTF) transaction allows the pharmacist to distinguish between instances when the prescriber will follow up with a new prescription versus simply denying a refill request; the DNTF transaction closes the loop and prevents the need for further phone calls or other communication.While DNTF responses are appropriate in some circumstances, they are not always used as originally intended and may result in additional charges for single prescriptions. As of May 1, 2013, Surescripts no longer charges for DNTF response messages for both retail and mail order prescriptions. Contact your pharmacy software vendor with examples of poor quality or miswritten electronic prescriptions.
All electronic prescriptions are routed through your software vendor, therefore they will be able to investigate this and determine if it’s an issue with the EHR. If needed, they will log a case with Surescripts.It is extremely important to report these cases to your pharmacy software vendor so that they can investigate and log a support case with Surescripts who then will research the matter and if needed contact the prescribers’ EHR vendor for further action and complete issue resolution.
A mutual non-disclosure agreement and contract need to be in place. Then an implementation project is launched between your IT staff and the implementation managers at Surescripts. Industry approved transactions are certified from your system to our network. These transactions include membership loads, formulary loads, eligibility and prescription history transaction sets and electronic prescription transactions if you offer mail order services. Surescripts works with your IT staff to secure your connection to the Surescripts network.
Surescripts Medication History for Reconciliation and ED Settings service provides real-time access to the largest set of medication claims and pharmacy fill data available, delivering a more complete picture of the patient at every step - from admission to discharge. This enables more informed treatment decisions across transitions of care, helping to reduce the patient risk of ADEs.
History Request: Authorized Staff requests history. Validated Request: The request is validated and queries are sent. Multi-source Response: Data from pharmacies and PBMs is sent. Aggregated Data: Data is aggregated and forwarded to requesterPharmacy Fill and PBM claims data include:. Name of drug.
Dosage. Quantity dispensed. Days supply. Dispensing pharmacy. Phone number of pharmacy. Prescription ll date.
Name of prescribing physician. Phone number of prescribing physician.
August 22, 2019 Showing Up for Patients, Prescribers and Pharmacists with Safe and Accurate E-PrescribingThere’s no shortage of innovation in healthcare. But, some of the most meaningful technology developments still have shortcomings. Take electronic prescribing, which successfully eliminated the ambiguity that exists in poor handwriting and ensured prescriptions reach the pharmacy within seconds.
Despite the remarkable benefits that patients, prescribers and pharmacists have reaped, we still have opportunities to improve the process.
Surescripts, the Arlington, Va.-based operator of a national clinical electronic network, and the Verona, Wisc.-based vendor Epic Systems are collaborating to integrate medication prior authorization into Epic electronic health records (EHRs).Surescripts’ CompletEPA for medication prior authorization will be available for Epic users, the organizations announced. The medication prior authorization process is an important administrative task that requires a variety of forms, faxes and phone calls to collect information to review and determine prescription coverage.To this end, Surescripts CompletEPA is a real-time electronic prior authorization (ePA) solution fully integrated into a physician’s EHR workflow that enables immediate information exchange between providers and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs). In collaboration with Epic, this solution has the potential to impact 100 million patients across the U.S., Surescripts officials say.Medication prior authorization is intended to control treatment costs, but it also adds thousands of dollars in administrative costs for doctors each year.
According to a report from Health Affairs, physicians spend an average of eight hours each week at an annual cost of up to $7,000 on filing paperwork, faxing and phone calls to process prior authorizations. Eventually this delay in treatment can cause patients to lose interest in treatment altogether, with 20-30 percent of patients abandoning their prescribed medications at the pharmacy.“Moving the prior authorization workflow into the EHR can save time for both physicians and payers,” Sumit Rana, Epic’s CTO, said in a statement. “It’s also good for patients when medications are approved faster, and they receive their prescriptions sooner.”.