The Electronic Medical Record (EMR) will affect every patient in this country. The EMR is a digital version of a paper chart that contains all of a patient’s medical history in one place. It is created and maintained in hospitals and ambulatory environments to give patients, physicians and other healthcare providers access to a patient’s medical records across facilities. An EMR helps providers to diagnose and treat patients by allowing them to track data over time, identify patients who are due for preventive visits and screenings, or monitor how patients measure up to certain parameters. The EMR can improve overall quality of care in a practice.
The storage of EMR information allows for a continuum of care between the medical provider and the hospital. The provider can access the patient’s history, current condition and overall plan of care. Digital images are stored and can be accessed and viewed by the medical provider anywhere an internet connection is available using a secure login and password. The EMR allows for real-time information availability and has eliminated the requirement for future off-site storage of records and charts.
Additionally, fiscal value is attached to the EMR.
According to the provisions of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act of 2009, organizations that are eligible for the Medicare EHR Incentive Program and achieve meaningful use by 2014 will be eligible for incentive payments; those who have failed to achieve that standard by 2015 may be penalized. These Medicare and Medicaid EHR (Electronic Health Record) Incentive Programs provide financial incentives for the “meaningful use” of certified electronic health record technology to improve patient care. To receive an incentive payment, providers have to show that they are “meaningfully using” their electronic health records by meeting thresholds on a number of objectives.
