A task force formed by the Healthcare Financial Management Association and the American Institute of CPAs is expected to issue a report on the accounting treatment of electronic health records by the end of July, according to speakers at the HFMA's Annual National Institute in Orlando, Fla.

An initial white paper had been completed a while ago, but the Securities and Exchange Commission asked for further information from the task force. “We got a little sidetracked with the SEC,” said Gordon Edwards, chief financial officer for Gundersen Lutheran Health System, La Crosse, Wis., a speaker and member of the task force. “I thought we were done in January,” Edwards said after the speech.

Revenues are divorced from costs for accounting purposes under the task force's approach, said another speaker and task force member, Robert Wright, assurance partner with McGladrey & Pullen. And the approach recommended by the task force would allow estimated EHR payments to be recognized as revenue in the year for which they are expected to be earned, Wright said.

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