Last month, an AMA-convened panel of experts outlined the eight top challenges and solutions for improving electronic health records (EHR). Physicians weighed in on which EHR improvements would help them the most.
Here’s a sampling of what physicians had to say:
claudia koppelman: Refocus “ALL” to the real purpose of a medical record—patient care ... NOT data collection for statisticians and insurance/payers, and the quality of care as well as outcomes will improve with resultant decrease in costs.
jmilammd: Congrats, Steve, et. al., on an excellent document! After 2500+ deliveries, and 25 yrs. in private practice, you will be able to add my name to the list of those retiring early because the EHR and MU costs are not worth the cost of the lost time and sleep that I have experienced the last 5 months in my new job as a data entry clerk. Item #1 resonates the most w/ me since I feel no more enhanced today than I did last spring. The other posters have identified a variety of important issues; they’re not just whining. I hope CMS is listening!
dlmyers: Unfortunately, the EHR companies figured out first that they could sell a product, but there were and mostly still are no national standards to use in their design. That is how we got the mess we have now, by getting the cart before the horse.
buttery: All records should conform to a standard database lexicon so that records can be exchanged between physicians and hospitals, and allow research on health outcomes from use of medications and procedures.
cbschug: I am an emergency physician, have been the lead for a hospital roll out of Cerner Millennium and currently work with Epic. … Care will be better because of the EMR; I am living that daily. But it seems that many hospital admins / EMR companies are happy to stop with the basic function and meaningful use dollar, not the functional improvements that we docs need to be better doctors.
lorenzl: It would be nice for an EMR to actually help us practice cost-effective medicine .... I would love an EMR that is linked to the patient’s health insurance that could show me exactly what a particular medication and/or test would cost that patient in out-of-pocket expense. Seems a very simple thing for a computer system to do. That way, I could pick the most cost effective treatment for a patient’s problem, and let the patient know the likely out-of-pocket cost.
Read more comments at AMA Wire®.
Join the discussion: Which of the priorities resonates the most with you? Share your opinion in a comment below or on the AMA’s Facebook page.
