Social Security Administration and Cerner Teams Up

Cerner said this week that it has created a relationship with the Social Security Administration to expedite the filing of disability compensation claims. According to the vendor, the deal aims to make retrieving safe, clinical electronic health records more straightforward. Cerner is pleased to assist the federal government in providing better support to people in need by ensuring that they receive their benefits more swiftly and efficiently.

Applying for Social Security disability payments is notoriously difficult, and the COVID-19 pandemic has further added to the difficulty for many would-be recipients. Every year, the SSA demands more than 15 million medical records from 500,000 providers as part of its decision-making process — what it refers to as the “most frequent source of delay in the disability determination process. The most common format for these records is faxed or scanned images.

SSA said it aims to make determinations in a more rapid manner as a result of EHR retrieval relationships with Cerner and other health IT businesses and systems, allowing monies to reach those who need them more quickly. Cerner and SSA claim their data-automation partnership intends to minimise administrative burdens, cut expenses and labour, and eliminate the need for paper documents to be mailed.

It has the potential to lower uncompensated care, automate SSA payments, and boost patient satisfaction. Cerner plans to pilot the solution with three of its clients in the coming months, and then expand the offering to other clients who choose to join. Although Cerner’s interoperability solutions may link to hundreds of different EHRs, representatives said the project’s first focus is on supporting SSA’s connections to Cerner clients who wish to use the service.