The applications of Information Technology are seen in every aspect of life. The health care industry has also taken its impacts in the form of computerized health information systems called Electronic Medical Records (EMRs). These are specialized computerized systems that help health care organizations on managing important information of their patients, employees, and suppliers in an organized way. Electronic Medical Records are installed by large scale hospitals, medical laboratories, and health care institutions.
EMRs have built in functionalities to manage the input data in different forms and provide it to the staff of an organization. I believe the use of EMRs would be beneficial to a health care organization because it provides a systematic way of managing a patients’ data that would be shared with all members of that organization. These EMRs are efficient in storing the correct information of patients and allowing doctors to view this information efficiently. Electronic Medical Records (EMRs) are specialized software that are designed to help data management of hospitals, medical laboratories, and other health care institutions.
Electronic Medical Records; also known as Medical Record Management Software (MRMS) are computerized health information systems that are developed by IT companies for the usage of large health care institutions so that they can effectively manage their important information (Iyer, Levin, Shea, & Ashton, 135). EMRs are primarily used for the purpose of data management; including editing, modification, storage, and easy retrieval data (Scott, 59). Yet in 2008 only 22 percent of U. S. physicians and 35 percent of American hospitals had advanced EMR technology.
Some private clinics and practices don’t consider EMRs due to its expenses- installation of 25,000 dollars. But these expenses do not compare to the great benefits that come with EMRs. The installation of EMRs can be beneficial because quick access to our records can be lifesaving in a case of emergency. EMRs allow records to become more easily shared between doctors. With having easy access to a patients file, a doctor has all of the patient’s information that is needed during the emergency decision-making process.
EMRs also allow a doctor to insert new information about a patient onto that patient’s file which is available to other doctors and physicians. These doctors and physicians can share the issues and problems of their patients with other doctors and reach better diagnostic decisions. With the use of EMRs, health care organizations do not face any difficulty in accessing the required pieces of information whenever they are required. Also, with EMRs the chances of giving wrong information to the doctor are completely eliminated (Scott, 60).
Let’s say that a category five hurricane were to hit Miami, FL and would injure over 50,000 lives, through the use of EMRs, the doctors will have fast and efficient access to a patients file- giving him information like that patients’ blood type, any prescriptions he’s on, and even what medical conditions he has. All that information is available so quickly to a doctor. Another benefit of EMRs is that it also enables various departments of an organization to communicate with one another and share patients information and medical record in an efficient and secure way.
Take for an example a patient has just left the emergency room from a heart attack recovery and transferred to another facility- let’s say the Intensive Care Unit (ICU). That patient’s information has now been put into the system and become available to the skilled team of the ICU facility. That skilled team will perform on the patient a series of electrocardiograms and blood test, the information from these tests will be inserted into the EMRs and available to the doctor of that facility. Based on the information the doctor will then be able to prescribe the patient the right medication.
Electronic Medical Records can bring tremendous changes in the way health care institutions used to perform their day to day functions. Now they are able to access, edit, modify, store, and retrieve their important information with more efficiency and speed (Tranberg & Rashbass, 79). It is essential for health care organizations to purchase these computerized systems so that they operate more efficiently and manage patient’s data more safely. With EMRs installed in the organization, hospital staff can easily find the records of their patients without searching the whole files and documents around them (Schatz & Berlin, 264).
