Expanding ECDS Reporting in HEDIS: A Step Forward

11.20.2020 · Fern McCree, Senior Research Associate, NCQA

As part of its strategy to encourage sharing and interoperability of health data systems, NCQA is expanding the use of electronic clinical data into the Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set (HEDIS®). In 2019, NCQA digitized and added the Electronic Clinical Data Systems (ECDS) reporting standard to the following existing HEDIS measures for voluntary reporting:

Breast Cancer Screening
Colorectal Cancer Screening
Follow-Up Care for Children Prescribed ADHD Medication

Recognizing that plans are in different stages of health IT integration, NCQA released these measures for voluntary ECDS reporting alongside their traditional counterparts.

What are digital measures and why are they useful?

Digital measures are written as computer code and downloaded directly from the NCQA store. They use industry standards (Quality Data Model and Clinical Quality Language) which makes HEDIS easier to implement across the continuum of care. Easier and faster implementation in quality reporting systems lessens the need for human interpretation during programming, which improves the efficiency and dependability of measure calculations.

All ECDS measures are digital, but not all digital measures are ECDS

A growing subset of HEDIS measures use ECDS reporting, which promotes the expanded and more standardized use of electronic clinical data beyond traditional claims. ECDS relies on structured data within electronic data sources, including electronic health records, health information exchanges/clinical registries, case management systems, and administrative files (claims and enrollment data). ECDS measures incorporate many of the data sources that are considered “supplemental” for traditional HEDIS reporting. All ECDS measures are digital, but not all digital measures are ECDS.

NCQA is currently analyzing the HEDIS results for plans that reported both the traditional and ECDS versions of these measures. Analysis will help inform our understanding of health plans’ experience reporting using ECDS and the value of adding the ECDS method to other existing HEDIS measures in the future.

Join us in the Community forum to share your experiences reporting ECDS!

Fern McCree, Senior Research Associate, NCQA

Fern McCree, MPH is a Senior Research Associate in the Performance Measurement Department at the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA). Ms. McCree is responsible for managing and coordinating research, measure development and maintenance activities of health plan level quality measures. Her work is primarily focused on behavioral health, geriatric and risk adjustment utilization. Ms. McCree also leads efforts to develop measures within the electronic clinical data system (ECDS) domain which aims to enable reporting health plan level measures using data sources that provide more accurate and timely clinical information. Ms. McCree holds a Masters of Public Health from The George Washington University and a Bachelor in Science in Public Health Administration from Temple University.