Possibility of National Electronic Medical Records System Growing

A couple months ago I made mention of this to a few and nobody took it seriously, and yet here today, somebody’s talking about it! After the announcement of the program in the works for the NHS, I bounced this off a couple physicians, and they did agree, it sure would be simple to have one common user interface that would be the same at any hospital instead of the varied and many systems in place today, so this group might be on to something here. Perhaps the EMR/EHR vendors someday will have a meeting of the minds to bring some similarity in screens to the forum. I was mainly speaking regarding hospital interfaces, but the ones used in an office could benefit as well.

Ok and here’s a link to a project from Microsoft while I’m on the subject…Silverlight…web based and supports many platforms, even Linux (Moonlight project) is in the works. The key with any software pertaining to medical records is to get as much patient information in an organized fashion on the screen, with as few “clicks” as possible and integrate with dictation. Anyway, there is some research already started in this direction. Related story on Vanderbilt University’s use with Silverlight here…BD

Universal health coverage could make a national electronic medical record (EMR) infrastructure critical to managing such a massive, complex health-care system. A national move to EMRs would create new business opportunities for the IT industry. These gatherings allowed Accenture to test the waters of citizen receptivity to a national EMR system. Meeting attendees have been surprisingly open to the EMR idea, said Ken Dineen, global managing director of Accenture's health industry practice. The company's polling data showed 79 percent support for EMR among Miami citizens, 59 percent in Detroit and 74 percent in San Francisco. Privacy and security concerns about such a system fuel the usual objections. EMR advocates insist the common practice of transferring handwritten medical records between medical establishments is arcane. Dr. Paul Volberding, chief of medical service for the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center, expressed that view on the event's panel.

Possibility of National Electronic Medical Records System Growing - Government Technology