LINKS: Open Season on EMR Shortcomings

LINKS: Open Season on EMR Shortcomings

Dark Daily compiled a list of links that fire off some major EMR problems. Looks like too many messages and poor design is proving to be one step forward, two steps back for some doctors.

“Information Overload and Missed Test Results in Electronic Health Record–Based Settings” | JAMA Internal Medicine
You can check out the complete abstract of the recent study that found ~30% of doctors have missed an EMR notification, due to the staggering volume of them. (subscription required) VIEW POST

“One Third Of Doctors Admit to Overlooking Electronic Test Results” | Time
In this article, Time admits that too much of good thing can cripple an EMR. However, designing easier ways for physicians to access the information, and properly training personnel to use the systems effectively could help. A lead researcher claims, “We all want the alerts to look like our smartphones and Apple products, but the interface is not always clear and you can miss results quite easily.” We can’t wait to hear what this researcher has to say about Atlas.md. VIEW POST

“Many Docs Miss Test Results in VA’s EHR” | Med Page Today
Here’s an article with some more insight into the VA EMR study. Respondents who said they found an EHR system easy to use were much less likely to say they had missed results, suggesting that good design is correlated to EMR success (as we’d figure). Another factor that helped doctors not miss a message was affirmation that respondents consistently notify patients of abnormal results, and that they always follow up on alerts in the VA EHR system. However, this brings us back to that same issue where we’re tying ribbons to one finger to remind us check the ribbon on the other hand. Still feels like the most successful EMRs will be able to prioritize notifications. VIEW POST

“Some docs miss test results with electronic records” | Reuters
In this article, researcher Hardeep Singh tells Reuters Health, “There are a few steps that may help ensure doctors see all lab results. Those include training doctors to use the electronic system’s settings to weed out unimportant alerts, giving doctors more time to go through results and making sure there is someone responsible for following up every time a test is performed on a patient.” A separate EHR researcher, Dr. Alexander Turchin, thinks it’s possible to design EHR systems in which errors are much less common, saying, “I think we do need to continue… improving the systems. Even if harm is rare, it should be rarer still.” Case and point to why we’re building an EMR for direct care doctors, because we completely agree. VIEW POST