Leave my patients ’ health data alone!

The patient looked angry and I felt his frustration. His voice was rising, “Why is the chart 54 pages long? My son has only been here five times!” In the olden, pre-electronic health record days, chances are the chart would most likely have been less than 10 pages. However, since the government takeover of medical records, this is no longer the case. When the government rolled out its meaningful use regulations and the now upcoming MACRA laws, the medical record got pumped up as if by a rapid infusion of body-enhancing steroids. In the state of NJ, the law states that I can charge $1 per page to produce a copy of medical records for patients. Hence, the patient wasn’t upset by the length of the record but more the cost of producing it. When EHRs first appeared, the goal was to develop interoperability where all programs could communicate with each other. This would make the issue of copying records extinct. A treating physician could just go into the master data highway and retrieve whatever records are needed to treat the patient. This is a noble goal indeed, yet EHR vendors and lawmakers failed at achieving even a semblance of this shared data dream. Continue reading ... Your patients are rating you online: How to respond. Manage your online reputation: A social media guide. Find out how.
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - Category: Journals (General) Authors: Tags: Tech Health IT Source Type: blogs