ACEP announced in late August that it has developed a Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS) registry reporting option and is providing it to ACEP, Emergency Medicine Residents’ Association (EMRA), and Society of Emergency Medicine Physician Assistants (SEMPA) members at a discount. The registry comes in response to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services announcement that failure to satisfy the 2014 PQRS requirements may lead to a penalty of up to 4 percent of Medicare payments, approximately $2,500 per provider.

In 2014, a group of 10 or more eligible professionals may avoid the 2 percent PQRS penalty as well as the 2 percent value-based modifier (VBM) penalty (both applied to 2016 payments) if at least 50 percent or more of the individual eligible professionals in the group satisfy PQRS reporting requirements in 2014.

Even one Medicare fee-for-service claim for the calendar year qualifies a provider (physician or non-physician) as an eligible professional in a group for purposes of the 50 percent threshold.

However, emergency physicians should note that those eligible professionals in the group who do not submit PQRS measures will still be subject to the PQRS payment adjustment of 2 percent. To avoid the 2 percent VBM penalty, at least 50 percent of individual EPs in a group must meet the minimum PQRS reporting requirements.

For more information on these requirements, please visit www.acep.org/quality.

Groups that decide to participate in the 2014 PQRS group practice reporting option (GPRO) are required to register through the Physician Value-Physician Quality Reporting System (PV-PQRS) Registration System by Sept. 30, 2014. This registration process can take up to two weeks. Groups will need an Individuals Authorized Access to the CMS Computer Services (IACS) account to access the PV-PQRS Registration System.

Registration lets CMS know which groups want to be analyzed at the group level (or TIN-level analysis). Complete information about IACS and 2014 PQRS GPRO registration is available on the CMS website.

Whether emergency physicians decide to report as a group via GPRO registry or to report as individuals, the ACEP PQRS Wizard registry option will be available. To participate via GPRO, the group must complete the PV-PQRS registration process by Sept. 30, 2014. Those reporting as individuals may sign up through Dec. 31, 2014.

ACEP is providing its registry to ACEP, EMRA, and SEMPA members with $100 off the $299 per provider fee. The College has negotiated an additional discount of 10 percent for groups of 10 or more and 15 percent for groups of 20 or more. For more information, go to www.acep.org/qualityregistry.