EHR - theory and practice
Medical records are trying to go digital. Operative word here is trying, as the word “try” indicates the possibility of failure.
The goal in the US is to have EHR for all Americans (or rather patients in the US) by 2014. The main problem lies not in the fact that it costs about $40,000 for a practice to put the system in place. The more troubling notion is lack of a common standard. What’s the use of having an EHR when you change doctors, and the new one can’t read it?
"Researchers found that just 4 percent of physicians have adopted "fully functional" computerized health records systems that help them make decisions about patient care or order tests. Another 13 percent have a more basic system." - Reuters article
That's not much, now is it? What about the other 87%? Where are they? How likely are they to install and fully utilize a EHR system? 
There is a very interesting read from EHR/EMR implementation project by Wendy Wickham. She goes into excruciating details of EHR implementation for a large hospital (over all seven geographic locations) and about 3000 users (including doctors, students, nurses and all the support staff). Imagine training the lot!
John D. Halamka, MD, the CIO of CareGroup Health System, writes about issues he faces as a provider of EHR technology. In his blog he often stresses the incompatibility of systems an wrong functionality of it. What is the use of the greatest data sharing system, if it only has limited access? His company has several ideas how to manage single patient records from multiple (not always same network) locations. But we will have to wait a few years to see the degree of success of this approach.
Finishing off, we are still faced with the other, almost minor, issue - the rising costs. If it takes about $40,000 per doctor to set up a family practice of five doctors in the local community will be set back roughly $200,000 just to get the system up and running. What about maintenance costs? Simply put: with the planned freeze on the reimbursement rates how will clinics be able to afford it? More importantly, the $150 million dedicated by Medicare to 12 cities to set up EHR is a drop in the bucket of the ocean of financial need.
Song of the day:
The Cranberries - Time Is Ticking Out
I went to an open air movie at the Centennial Park with Brie last night. There I was confronted with a sad reality of the overweight South. It's been said that it's a pandemic. I think it's a self induced one. I mean, when I see a mother giving a soda to a small child/toddler, my blood boils. What we put in to our bodies has an immediate (and long term) effect on our health and well being. I had a long conversation with a friend in Poland about it, so it resonates even stronger with me now.
bezpodstawne. Ale nie jest to nienormalne, bo każdy naród tak ma. Tyle, że my mamy tak dużą dozę polityki wmieszaną w te aspiracje, że czasami zastanawiam się, o co tak naprawdę tutaj chodzi. PZPN się miota – członkowie nie potrafią przyjąć wspólnego frontu, a drużyna… No cóż – chłopcy nie grają ze sobą spójnie. Nie ma jednolitości w drużynie, zawodnicy miotają się po boisku jakby zastanawiając się czy na innych graczach można polegać. Wiele razy w trakcie meczów widziałam jak „zapominają”, na jakiej pozycji grają. Mamy świetnych zawodników. Każdy z osobna jest super, ale jak się ich złoży do kupy, to nie mamy szans na sukces. Dodajmy do tego trenera, który choć na ogół dobry (w końcu dotarliśmy do mistrzostw, nie?) to momentami podejmuje błędne decyzje. Bo jak inaczej można nazwać trzymanie Smolarka na ławce 
podczas ostatniego meczu? 
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