Doctors now spend more time with computers than they do with patients

This bodes poorly for future physician quality:The doctor won't see you nowDANIELLE OFRIPittsburgh Post-Gazette August 11, 2013 12:03 amBy Danielle Ofri Like the mail carrier or the milkman of yore, the doctor makes rounds every day in the hospital. If it's an academic institution, a bevy of medical students, interns and residents accompany an attending physician from room to room, checking up on the patient, doing a daily physical exam, reviewing the latest test results and highlighting the relevant teaching points. That's been the mainstay of medical education, and that's how my colleagues and I were taught to train the next generation of doctors.Alas, this image would be true today only if a computer terminal were plunked in the bed instead of a patient. A new study in the Journal of General Internal Medicine confirms what any physician or patient could tell you: Doctors spend more time with computers than they do with patients. In fact, computers handily beat out patients: Medical interns spent 40 percent of their day with a computer compared with 12 percent of their day with actual living, breathing patients. (Discussing cases with other health care professionals and educational activities were the other main activities of the day.)... Nurses are practically chained to their computers these days. A typical outpatient office visit today consists of a doctor focused directly at a screen, and a patient waiting, ahem, patiently, while the doctor thrashes it out...
Source: Health Care Renewal - Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Tags: Danielle Ofri healthcare IT difficulties Source Type: blogs