Benefits of Electronic Medical Records

Electronic medical records system, abbreviated as EMR, preserves your medical papers or documents in e-format, and thus helps you do away with all the hassles of maintaining the traditionally used medical files full of paper documents and paper clips.

Welcome to the era of cutting edge technology, wherein preservation of documents in paper form is being steadily replaced by their preservation in e-format or digital format.

Medical history, diagnosis, transcription, bills, health insurance, and important notes about a particular case, are stored as a part of a patient's EMR. While this system does help in retrieving patient records easily, the overall benefits of this system don't just end there.

Electronic data management is preferred over documentation on paper, as it saves time and increases efficiency of the tasks wherein the said data is used. Electronic medical records system is a subset of electronic data management, which is used in health industry for maintaining patient's data in a computerized electronic format.

EMR is no doubt a boon to the health information technology as the records for every patient are maintained, immaterial of what his ailment is, and made available at the fingertips. Access to all this information about the patient helps health care professionals carry out proper diagnosis of the underlying condition, and initiate the treatment well in time.

As we mentioned earlier, there exist several advantages of electronic medical records (EMR), right from its efficiency to its security. The benefits of EMR also include the high quality documents which can be easily audited, as they are in organized format. Discussed below are the details of all these EMR benefits in detail.

A patient with complex ailments may visit several doctors and get multiple opinions, only to be left in utter confusion with the whole lot of overlapping advice that he is subjected to in the entire process.

In such circumstances, EMR comes as a boon for the patient as well as the hospital management as a common record for the 'said' patient with all the intricate details concerning his medical history and diagnosis is enlisted in it. At the same time, it also reduces the unnecessary duplication of testing and prescribed medication.

In earlier days, faxing and emailing details between doctors, often resulted in waste of precious time. There was the need of putting all the information about the patient, like health reports, x-rays, lab tests and prescription, on a common platform wherein other doctors could access it without much trouble.

This is exactly what the EMR system does; it puts all the information about a patient together and the doctors can access it right away, without having to lose precious time waiting for inputs from the other doctors. This benefit of electronic medical record particularly comes handy when it comes to medical emergencies.

Irrespective of whether it is about the person's health or wealth, confidentiality of data is very important. In EMR, due importance is given to this aspect of patient's life. At the same time, regular monitoring of record access helps the authorities check for statistical abnormalities (indicating unauthorized access of data) if any, and rectify them - thus helping keep the data secure.

Maintenance of the records is very important, and that becomes all the more convenient with the use of EMR. The records can be maintained up-to-date, with all necessary changes incorporated in the records, time to time. The changes once done, can be accessed by all the users irrespective of the location. That the data can be printed with various fonts, colors and size is yet another benefit of EMR.

Maintaining patient data in paper form always consumes time for data retrieval. An EMR, on the other hand, can be accessed by patients/doctors as and when they want. In fact, they also have the liberty of choosing whether they want to retrieve data chronologically or in reverse order. The ability to access the requisite data from multiple locations, as the EMR are shared across the network, is yet another important benefits of this system.

There exists a facility wherein the medication listed in the EMR can be checked for authenticity. If the prescribed medication is found in United States Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) safety alert list, the patient who has been prescribed this medication, is flagged. Besides this, information on drugs and their dosage is also provided in electronic medical records. Insurance on medical claims becomes easier by this method as the settlement of medical billing and claims is done faster through EMR software.

Handwritten notes by the doctors, are not legible in most of the cases - if not all. Misinterpreting these notes can lead to misdiagnoses, and delay the treatment (or even initiate wrong treatment) which, in turn, can lead to further complications. On-screen/printed document is any day readable than what a handwritten document is, and that is where electronic medical records are of great help.

EMR software, which helps in electronic data storage, incorporates all the details - including the clinical decision support, diagnosis, e-prescriptions, etc., into the EMR system. Benefits of EMR also include savings in drug expenditure, decreased errors in billing, improved utilization of radiology tests, and so on. Even though the initial investment is a bit hefty, the estimated net benefit availed from using an EMR for a period of five years is somewhere around $US 86,400-$US 140,100, per provider.

In the era of advanced technology, wherein a considerably large part of the population is computer savvy, the user-friendly electronic medical record system is of great help. Though there do exist risks like hacking and/or cracking EMR software, regular software updates on the system and proper network security measures, can help you keep these risks at bay.

At the end of the day, electronic medical record improves the quality of health care and minimizes the risks involved; and as far as the cost issue is concerned it is compensated over the period.