Canada: Province-wide electronic medical record computer system 'glitch' causing patients to be turned away from care

This story describes a very bad scenario for sick Canadians.  I offer just a few pithy comments, as not much more than that is needed:http://medicinehatnews.com/news/local-news/2014/06/10/system-failure-has-docs-patients-upset/System failure has docs, patients upsetBy Gillian Slade on June 10, 2014Many patients were turned away from their doctor’s office Monday because a province-wide electronic medical record computer system had collapsed.Province-wide.  Stunning.  A very big argument against centralization of EHR resources.“This is the third straight week of issues with the TELUS Wolf system,” said Dr. Donovan Nunweiler at Southlands Medical Clinic. “We feel we were encouraged by government to switch to Wolf and now it’s not working.”I wonder when someone in the Canadian government is  going to issue that now-famous slogan "but patient safety has not been compromised"...A year ago 202 physician clinics across Alberta using TELUS Wolf were unable to access patient records for most of the day.More than 200 physician clinics are blind, deaf and dumb?  Wonder what happens to acute patients on days like that.On Monday patients arrived only to be told the electronic patient files were not accessible making it impossible to see test results, past medical history and medications.Paper never goes on strike.  Perhaps elimination of paper completely is not such a good idea?“This is affecting me big time and affecting my income,” said Ken H...
Source: Health Care Renewal - Category: Health Management Tags: Alberta Canada healthcare IT crash healthcare IT dangers healthcare IT difficulties TELUS Wolf Source Type: blogs