Who's in charge of the EMR process?

A Harvard Medical School professor David Blumenthal has been named the man for the job by President Obama to oversee the transition of Electronic Medical Records and the some $19 billion dollars invested in it by the stimulus package. Blumenthal has worked as a the director of health policy at Massachusetts general hospital, and comes from many years of teaching and learning in the health care industry. He has worked along side Edward Kennedy back in 1977-80 as a member of his health policy staff.
There is still much work to be done if we are to meet the goal of having converted to EMRs by the year 2014. There continues to be a struggle of cost and privacy issues which will surely be the two biggest obstacles Mr. Blumenthal will have to overcome as we attempt to improve health care through this technology. There has been some growing skepticism as the rapid change over to EMRs hasn't been quite as explosive as many proponents would have liked. Europe has been attempting to switch to EMR's for many years longer than the United States and yet still has a long way to go. Having a seasoned scholar like Mr. David Blumenthal of Harvard ought to be a significant boost however in furthering the cause of improving our health care industry through EMR's.

Instant Physician Network

Practice Fusion as mentioned in my previous post is a company based out of San Francisco that reached an agreement with Google to provide EMR software for free, paid for by Google ads. With the implementation of many smaller offices to EMRs, Practice Fusion has seen the creation of what they call "Instant Physician Network" a term for EMR 2.0, meaning and interactive experience for physicians exchanging ideas and treatments. They call this charting of methods "Live in five" (meaning the information is available to a large group of physicians almost instantaneously after a method is documented electronically). The initial idea of an electronic medical record was simply for one particular office to have the record of their patients and allow patients access to their own record. It was still a good idea and more efficient than paper, but with an internet web based focus now with the idea of sharing ideas we are seeing what could very well rapidly develop cures and vaccines like never before. The one problem that some offices are encountering with this EMR software however seems to be the financial side of these offices. There has been a feeling of contentment with the medical information that is being saved electronically and the ease with which it is shared. However some offices complain that not having financial statements along with clients medical information is causing some serious head aches. It will be interesting as we see how adjustments are made to this end. One thing is certain, where ideas are being shared and explored freely we are more likely to see significant advancements in the health care industry.

Google Getting In On EMR's

Powerhouse internet website "Google" has reached an agreement with Practice Fusions which is a company that specializes in web based EMR software. The long and short of the agreement is that the EMR software will be free and financed by Google ads. This is likely to be very beneficial for smaller practices as the transition from going from the old paper records in their office to electronic records generates a steep upfront cost. With this agreement with Practice Fusion there will be no licensing fee or charges for hosting. The company even has a blog which is updated to help smaller and even bigger facilities with ideas how to change from a paper office to an "e-office". Google has assured that they will not have access to the information on these records insuring privacy. The ads that will fund this free EMR service provided by Practice Fusions will largely from different prescription drug companies, hospitals, and doctor's offices. There are several companies that exist currently that provide high tech EMR software that provide physician to physician contact as well as patient to physician contact in ways never before imagined. The problem however is that almost all of these companies are in the business of making money and charge a large sum of money for their software. Perhaps with this recent development of Google forming an agreement with Practice Fusion we may see a lot more smaller less financially powerful practices able to convert their offices to electronic medical records.

Spending on EMRs

With the economy being what it is and the necessity to grow economic development throughout all industries of our country, what is the government doing to improve the health care industry? We have all heard of the stimulus package that was debated vigorously and finally passed not too long ago, so what effect will the stimulus and spending in general have on health technology? The Obama administration has set apart $17.4 billion of the stimulus package dedicated for the advancement and use of health technology with Electronic Medical Records as the head liner of the field. Additionally, over the next 5 years an additional $50 billion dollars will be spent on improving health technologies which will ultimately reduce health care costs and improve current practices, methods, and technologies while creating more patient friendly records. President Obama had this to say about it, "We're still using paper. We're still filing things in triplicate. Nurses can't read the prescriptions that doctors have written out. Why wouldn't we want to put that on an electronic medical record that will reduce error rates, reduce our long-term costs of health care and create jobs right now?" Many are uncomfortable that our government would keep spending so much money with how far in debt we are as is, however an investment placed in health care is not one we are likely to regret. For being the leader of all nations when it comes to technology, innovations, and wealth, our health care system is still very mediocre, with an increased emphasis on health technologies, we should see some drastic improvement over the next few years.

Inside the numbers

What is happening within the world of health technology? Money is being spent in large amounts, what short term and long term real numbers are we seeing from the billions of dollars being put into it? A survey conducted by the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NAMCS) shows that 1 in 4 physicians offices are completely or partially using Electronic Medical Records currently. Interestingly offices in the Midwest and west were more likely to use EMR's than those in the Northeast.
A common concern for offices that have not switched to electronic records is that the upfront cost of switching is too steep and they are financially unable to cope with such a large sum of money upfront going out the door. Another study showed that by converting to electronic records that the savings per provider would be quite significant and well worth the investment: $86,400 was the average projection of savings per provider in a 5 year period if they switched to electronic records. For the nation as a whole a republican representative from Pennsylvania named Tim Murphy has projected $78 billion dollars savings annually from electronic medical records, not to mention the tremendous health care efficiency benefits and over well being of the American people.

Road Blocks to Converting to Electronic Medical Records

What is medical identity theft? Why would someone want to steal my medical identity? Stealing one's medical identity is simply taking one's medical history including prescriptions so as to use the history to get surgeries or drugs they would otherwise be unable to get if not insured. So why then would electronic medical records have any effect on the number of medical identity thefts? Experts think it will become even easier for those people to get individuals records online or hack into data bases of medical facilites to get the records they want. Currently of all identity theft, medical identity only accounts for about 3% of all identity theft, but experts think that number will rise dramatically with the creation of electronic medical records.
We can obviously see the great importance of having a very strong firewall and taking every precaution necessary to ensure the privacy of these medical records. Perhaps a more startling and bigger problem however is that there seems to be a growing trend in the number of "inside" jobs of medical identity theft. Workers in health care facilities helping friends/ families file false insurance claims using the records of other people. One particular case showed a worker help a cousin receive close to $3 million dollars in false claims. So as we move toward a future of electronic medical records one of the great obstacles we need to overcome is to ensure privacy and safety of these records so that it truly does not the American person money instead of causing heartache, headache, and finincial perrils.

Q & A

Q: What is an Electronic Medical Record (EMR) exactly?
A: It is just as it sounds like, a record kept digitally that tracks a person's medical information, which will ideally cut costs, time, and increase efficiency in the medical realm.
Q:What are some of the possible benefits of having electronic medical records?
A: Specialists feel converting to electronic medical records will reduce errors significantly, make patient-doctor communication better, over time save the health care industry a lot of money and generally improve health care.
Q: How long would it take for the United States to convert to electronic medical records?
A: It is uncertain how long of a time frame it will be, the lowest or most optimistic predictions are by the end of 2011, some experts say it would take over a decade to be fully converted to these electronic records.
Q: What are some drawbacks from converting to electronic medical records?
A: Opponents to the idea of having a network of electronic medical records are two fold. The first being that it will not protect the privacy of the patient sufficiently, and secondly it will be a tremendous cost to convert all medical records digitally, a cost that does not yield equal benefits as its cost.
Q: Has there been any facilities that have tried converting their files to be held electronically?
A: Yes, in the state of Massachusetts, they are a pilot program converting 14,000 physicians offices to electronic records by 2012, and 63 hospitals by 2014.
Q: What else may result from everyone having an electronic medical record besides patients information being readily available and easily transferable?
A: Some experts say that it will lead to decreased trips to the doctor's office allowing patients to view information from their home and communicating with professionals via email.
Q: What precautions are or will be taken in insuring privacy of each clients record?
A: There is still debate in legislation as to how these records will be handled, the Obama administration has assured that privacy will be taken care of sufficiently when asked about the topic.
Q: Are there risks associated with medical fraud or identity theft?
A: Unfortunately yes, many critics who oppose funding a project that will potentially risk confidential information being stolen and manipulated argue that it puts the American public at a high risk for having their medical information corrupted and stolen.
Q: What implications does this system have on drug prescriptions?
A: Already, Medicare gives doctors a 2% bonus of they use an electronic prescribing system, many offices have reported millions in savings from using "E-prescribing". It also reduces risk of misprescribing from doctors and assistants from writing incorrect drugs or amounts.
Q: Where would a person be able to access their medical record?
A: Anywhere in the world, with an internet connection.