Electric Health Record (EHR) - Essay Example

? We Can But Should We? s of Learning: s We Can But Should We? IntroductionAn electric health record (EHR) is the traditional paper chat that was commonly used by clinical officers, but now it has been made digital. Just like the paper chat, it contains all the treatment and medical records regarding a particular patient in a specific practice. By using the HER, clinicians are in a position to track the patient’s data over some period of time enabling them to easily identify the patients who are supposed to undergo preventive screening, check on the patient’s progress on parameters like vaccines, readings on blood pressure as well as improving and monitoring of the entire care quality of the patients. Since its introduction, the use of EHR has arguably contributed positively in making record keeping of patients more accurate, easier, more efficient and comprehensive. Since the introduction of EHR more than 40 years ago, the device has met both support and opposition. Most people consider EHR introduction as a controversial adoption in the health sector which raises issues such as excessive involvement by the government and privacy invasion. They regard the device as invading the privacy of patients is inefficient and the storage of records is not secure. Other people believe that this introduction is a significant step in improving healthcare services and processes. Those in support argue that the adoption has ensured better service coordination among healthcare providers and professionals, it is cost effective and offers safer recoding of patients information (Ohno-Machado, 2011). Advantages The use of EHRs in healthcare processes has greatly reduced errors that were characteristic of medical records. The records that were hand written in the past had many human errors as a result of illegibility, misspelling and varying terminologies. EHRs have made it possible for all the health records for patients to be standardized. The EHR introduction has also served as a solution for the problem of loosing paper records. Physical records were prone to destruction by floods, fire and other catastrophes that happen naturally leading to patients and clinicians losing data. By using EHR, the records are stored digitally thus can remain virtually stored forever and for the longest time possible. The device also helps in storing health information which the patients are fond of forgetting after some time such as previous medications, illness and inoculations. By consolidating all the relevant data, health care becomes cost-effective. Paper records that were previously used were stored in different locations thus accessing them was money and time consuming. There are also a significant deficit in the process of exchanging medical information between the physicians that are based in hospitals and the primary care physicians. One of the major benefits of EHRs in the health care is the role the system played in the children hospitalized with asthma. Before the introduction of EHRs, only 4% of the children managed to get the asthma plan of action before they were discharged. Upon implementation, the number significantly increased as more than 58% of the children had the chance to benefit from the asthma action plan before they left the hospital (Hebert, 2008). The use of EHRs has also been credited for saving lives. This is because it ensures rapid identification of the patient’s risks and an easy access of the medical history of patients, enabling rapid treatment and diagnosis in all situations including emergencies. A good example is the case of patients with heart problems and diabetes who are prone to attacks and collapsing. The device is also useful in accident situations and other trauma cases where the victims involved are not in a position to respond to questions. This was evident in the Hurricane Katrina incident (Ohno-Machado, 2011). Disadvantages Among the main opponents of the EHRs are the groups advocating for privacy rights. Such groups believe that the use of EHRs threatens the privacy of patients. They argue that with the use of such devices, the entire patients medical history is digitized thus can be accessed by almost everybody. This to them is an incursion into the privacy of people’s life. The easy access to people’s medical records can also lead to a situation where such information can be used against an individual like in cases of college scholarship, job application, and insurance cover. Most people suffering from diabetes and other illnesses are normally discriminated in the job market. The use of EHR may also lead to the healthcare services and processes loosing the human touch. The digitization process may lead to the lost of the interpersonal aspect in the medical field. In the traditional hospital charts, doctors were given the chance to write what they had diagnosed about a patient at that particular incident and had time to elaborate on the patient’s situation. In cases of EHRs, healthcare professionals are expected to simply cross and tick in boxes in electronic forms. This situation forces them to think and react in categories thus can seldom write down their personal opinions. Due to lack of flexibility, there are increased cases of patient’s misclassification (Campbell, 2009). EHR system is also viewed as not being that efficient despite the standardizing and digitalization efforts. In most practical cases, EHR systems are not always compatible with the clinical systems or general practitioner systems. Some of the users of EHR have come out publically expressing their dissatisfaction. A good example happened in 2007 when nurses in Netherlands publicly claimed that they are totally dissatisfied with the EHR applications (Walker, 2005). In addition to this, the use of EHR is said to be unsafe and nor secure. The transfer of information between program providers and servers systems at some point leads to the loss of the high standards of patient’s health information to be damaged or lost. Conclusion/Recommendation Despite the setbacks associated with the use of EHRs in healthcare, this application has stood out as being of great significance in health services. They few disadvantages can be easily addressed to make the introduction more efficient. Better technology can be applied to make EHRs more efficient and standardized. Online Information accounts on personalized health such as Microsoft Health Vault and Google Health have been used to help patients have a better control of their personal medical records. The issues that still need to be addressed are privacy protection, data security and patient’s confidence towards EHRs. It is clear that the use of EHR will not be fully acceptable anytime soon, however, with the current digital world we living in, it will be inevitable to employ such applications. With data protections strategies and improved technology, the health care sector is optimistic that the issues will be solved. In order to cub the hacking of medical data and information, encryptions algorithms that are strong should be introduced. To address the issue of patient’s privacy, EHRs should be made in such away that they only reveal vital information like allergic reactions and blood type. For future prosperity in health care, such kinds of technologies have to be applied in order to make patients lives simpler and more secure. References Campbell, G., Donelan, K., et al. (2009). Use of Health Records in U.S. Hospitals;360(16): 1628-1638 Hebert, P., Federman, A. et al. (2008). Electronic Health Record Components and the Quality of Care. Med Care; 46(12):1267-72. Ohno-Machado, L. (2011). “Electronic health records and computer-based clinical decision support”: Are We There Yet? Med Inform Assoc. 1: 18(12): 109. Walker, J. Pan, E., et al. (2005).The Value of Health Care Information Exchange and Interoperability. New York: Health Aff. Read More