Viable

EMR: Exam room configuration

dsoul — Fri, 06 Oct 2006 21:35:17 -0700

In CanadianEMR there is a whole section devoted to disussion Exam Room configurations and set up of the equipment for ...

Eighth Annual Survey of Electronic Health Trends and Usage (2006)

dsoul — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 01:41:28 -0700

Available from the Medical Records Institute (pdf) is their latest annual survey of EHR Trends and Usage which reveals insights ...

Physician User Group leaders meet with PITO

dsoul — Sat, 30 Sep 2006 23:52:19 -0700

Leaders of the Vancouver Coastal Health Physician User Group met with representatives of the the Physician Information Technology Office (PITO) ...

Attachment problems complicate the transfer of information between EMRs

dsoul — Tue, 05 Sep 2006 20:40:18 -0700

Alan Brookstone posts on CanadianEMR an article about a complex problem evident in the UK as a result of the ...

Retention of Records when Transitioning to an EMR

dsoul — Sun, 27 Aug 2006 20:00:56 -0700

In CanadianEMR Alan Brookstone writes about the complex complex issues that arrive as we move to the EMR in physician ...

Report - Beyond Good Intentions Conference - Are we Getting Closer?

dsoul — Tue, 25 Jul 2006 19:48:37 -0700

Writing in CanadianEMR, Alan Brookstone reports on a conference in Montebello, Quebec sponsored by Canada Health Infoway and the Health Council of Canada and points to an interesting document arising from the session that reveals a number of insights relating to EHR implementation.

Dr. Brookstones piece can be found at:
canadianemr/2006/07/beyond_good_int.html

The document "Beyond Good Intentions: Accelerating the Electronic Health Record in Canada" can be found at:
healthcouncilcanada.ca/docs/papers/2006/infoway.pdf

Remote Access to your EMR

dsoul — Mon, 24 Jul 2006 19:34:46 -0700

As Alan Brookstone notes in a posting on CanadianEMR,

"one of the great benefits of an EMR is the ability ...

BCMA: EMR commitment worries B.C. MDs

dsoul — Tue, 04 Jul 2006 23:09:22 -0700

In this article in The Medical Post, Matt Borsellino reports from the BCMA Annual Meeting that there is a groundswell ...

The Search for the Holy Grail - 'Clinically Seductive Software'

dsoul — Wed, 14 Jun 2006 17:07:59 -0700

In CanadianEMR Alan Brookstone asks his readers:

"Have you used a clinically seductive EMR application or medical software tool? What ...

Physicians’ Use of Email With Patients: Factors Influencing Electronic Communication and Adherence to Best Practices

dsoul — Fri, 19 May 2006 16:57:44 -0700

In CanadianEMR Alan Brookstone reviews a study in the Journal of Medical Internet Research on Physician's use of e-mail with patients.

8 Lessons from Canada, Australia and England on EMR/EHR Implementation

dsoul — Wed, 10 May 2006 16:42:36 -0700

In CanadianEMR Alan Brookstone comments that:

"Canada is now being viewed as a leader in terms of establishing national leadership ...

EMR and Liability Exposure

dsoul — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 16:34:08 -0700

A short but interesting thread in CanadianEMR tackles the topic

"If a physician has fully or partially implemented an EMR, ...

Learning from Abroad: Lessons and Questions on Personal Health Records for National Policy

dsoul — Mon, 27 Mar 2006 16:20:03 -0800

Alan Brookstone in CanadianEMR points to an paper from the US based AARP that compares and contrasts approaches taken in ...

EMR Usability in the Exam Room

dsoul — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 15:09:31 -0800

In this piece in CanadianEMR Alan Brookstone writes about the need to develop best practices in the exam room during ...

Local EMR vs. ASP based EMR. Which is the right EMR solution?

dsoul — Wed, 08 Feb 2006 16:44:21 -0800

An interesting discussion on CanadianEMR about the relative merits/drawbacks that the competing models of local EMR vs. and ASP based ...

'Go Live' Without Going Nuts

dsoul — Tue, 31 Jan 2006 00:40:59 -0800

In this article in Physicians Practice, subtitled "Steps to a Successful EMR Implementation," Elaine Zablocki writes that

"... selecting and ...

WARNING - Silos of Information!

dsoul — Wed, 16 Feb 2005 17:58:51 -0800

Alan Brookstone writes: "It has always been my position that as much as possible, physicians who work collectively or geographically ..."

High Hopes Meet Harsh Reality

dsoul — Wed, 08 Dec 2004 17:48:32 -0800

In the CanadianEMR Alan Brookstone points to an interesting article in Managed Care Magazine outlining some of the challenges facing ...

The case for the 20 minute Case Study

dsoul — Thu, 02 Dec 2004 17:32:21 -0800

On CanadianEMR Alan Brookstone raises the question:

"what can you do when you evaluate an EMR one-on-one with a product ...

Portability of information between different EMR systems

dsoul — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 17:00:38 -0700

In CanadianEMR Alan Brookstone notes:

"One of the frequently recurring questions is that of portability of information between different EMR systems. Physicians have a concern that should they select a specific EMR system, they will be tied to that system and be unable to transfer that data to another system should the vendor go out of business or should they just want to move to a different system. The concern is well founded. Currently there is no approved data standard and accepted methodology for clinical information to be transferred between different systems."

A little bit of progress in this area of standardization would reap tremendous benefits far beyond reducing physicians fears of vendor lock-in -- a core message set would also be a much easier route to effective use of medical data than interoperability of systems would. But that's a story for another time... for the CanadianEMR discussion goto:
canadianemr/2004/10/portability_of_.html

US - 6th Annual Survey of Electronic Health Record Trends and Usage

dsoul — Wed, 28 Jul 2004 01:12:05 -0700

CanadianEMR contains a pointer to a survey from the US Medical Records Istitute that provides insight to some of the ...

Changes in lab reporting values - Creates a Dilemma

dsoul — Fri, 16 Jul 2004 21:18:50 -0700

In CanadianEMR Dr. Brookstone reports that a change in the presentation of lab results has eliminated a huge benefit that ...

Open Source EMR vs. Commercial EMR

dsoul — Tue, 01 Jun 2004 21:08:14 -0700

In this thread on CanadianEMR Dr. Brookstone initiates the debate with the comment:

"If open source EMR is the answer, how do we achieve a critical mass of end user/developers who have the skill set and time to ensure the ongoing development of the EMR, particularly as the needs and demands of the end user increase with the growing numbers of interfaces to labs, diagnostic imaging and hospital systems? I have visited some open EMR user forums and even as a tech savvy physician, I have difficulty understanding the technical jargon relating to implementation and system debugging."

The thread can be found at:
canadianemr/2004/06/open_source_emr.html

Practicing in Electronic Islands!

dsoul — Wed, 19 May 2004 20:56:29 -0700

In this debate in CanadianEMR physicians take a stab at the problem being unable to fully utilize EMR technology due ...

EMR: Lessons from Small Physician Practices

dsoul — Wed, 28 Apr 2004 20:24:12 -0700

In this posting on CanadianEMR, Alan Brookstone points to a paper published by theUniversity of California, San Francisco (avaialble at Electronic Medical Records: Lessons from Small Physician Practices ).

The paper includes reviews of:

costs versus benefit
the differences of benefits realized by five different types of physician users
the fact that the technology differences in packages do not fully explain the different results between different physician experiences

As Dr Brookstone notes this is an excellent description of issues faced by physicians in small practices and many the lessons likely hold true in other locales....
You can find his comments at:
canadianemr/2004/04/emr_lessons_fro.html

Some Comments on EMR from the British Experience

dsoul — Sat, 17 Apr 2004 20:10:44 -0700

In this article on CanadianEMR the comments of Dr. Mike Bainbridge (Head of Clinical Application Design for the National Programme for IT in the NHS, England) during a visit to Vancouver are recorded including this note wrt to electronic prescribing:

"the trick seems to not overload the physician with a lot of annoying warnings. The Prodigy project in the UK was to provide physicians with help on adverse reactions but it was a failure because the physicians turned the application off because of the annoyance factor."

The comments also include notes that nomenclautures and classification systems serve very different functions and describes (briefly) the difference between SNOMED and ICD.
canadianemr/2004/04/the_following_c.html

High Speed Internet Access

dsoul — Sun, 11 Apr 2004 19:48:29 -0700

In this thread in CanadianEMR, Dr Brookstone indicates:

"the high-speed access provides me with quick and easy access to information that I need at the point of care. I would no longer want to manage without it."

and asks about security concerns of having direct access to the Internet through the EMR.
canadianemr/2004/04/hish_speed_inte.html

The Impact of EMR on Staff

dsoul — Mon, 29 Mar 2004 19:12:55 -0800

Alan Brookstone has noted that it is not unusual to have a high turnover of staff in the early stages ...

How do you backup patient data?

dsoul — Wed, 17 Mar 2004 19:03:28 -0800

In this discussion (4 posts) in Canadian EMR the question of backing up an EMR system is discussed ... options ...

Is age a factor in coverting to EMR?

dsoul — Fri, 12 Mar 2004 18:16:57 -0800

In this discussion in the CanadianEMR (including 5 comments), Alan Brookstone notes that many physicians who are reaching the end ...