One of the fastest ways to get either a very strong positive or negative response from health care providers is to mention the possibility of considering the use of an EMR. For some it seems the best idea since sliced bread or the invention of the wristwatch. Others consider it the proverbial ‘tool of the devil” designed to torment and perplex the very soul of mankind.
Having had the fortune and misfortune of deploying or attempting to deploy an electronic medical in three state systems does make me somewhat of an expert on the process. I feel like Thomas Edison, I now know a number of ways of “ how not to make a light bulb.” This article will be a multi-part presentation of what are some of the “road lessons” that we have learned by “boldly going where no one has gone before.”
Why would anyone want to subject himself or herself to such a radically different way of conducting the process of providing health care? Certainly some of the physicians would say, “I am too busy to be typing my notes—that’s for the medical transciptionist to do!” Or possibly, “I don’t know how to type,” which in this day and age of the QWERTY keyboard is kin to some form