The Joint Commission has released an online guide for critical access hospitals that use scribes to help health care providers enter data into electronic health records, Modern Healthcare reports.
According to the guide, scribes should sign and date all entries that they make in an EHR. A licensed practitioner then should "authenticate the entry" by signing and dating it, as well as adding a time stamp if applicable.
If a hospital is using Joint Commission accreditation to qualify for Medicare reimbursement, then the scribe's entry must include a time stamp added by the licensed practitioner.
The Joint Commission notes that it "does not endorse nor prohibit the use of scribes" but that hospitals should meet certain requirements when they employ scribes (Conn, Modern Healthcare, 7/16).