Electronic Medical Records Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Electronic Medical Records - Essay Example The objective is to bring out essentials from business hype. These are rated reasonably well in forums (Health Technology Review) While EMR as a terminology gets routinely mixed up with Electronic Health records (EHR's), it is clarified early on that EMR's are different from EHR's. Electronic Medical Records are legal sources of information owned by Physicians and are fed to higher level systems like EHR. So, in our study a Centricity EMR would exchange patient information securely with an EHR like Veterans Health Information Systems and Technology Architecture (VistA) EMR's can be standalone "In Patient" or "Ambulatory systems" facilitating seamless exchange of information. They could be integrated with Practice Management Systems for use in a small practice or scaled adequately for a multi specialty practice. A comparative analysis as in the next section brings out key similarities and features of 3 different EMR systems. eClinicalWorks (eCW) is a leading Scalable Web based EMR system that has capabilities to work in small, mid and large setups. It is extensible and could be integrated with Practice Management systems. As a leader in "In Patient" and "Ambulatory EMR" systems that enhances a physician's ability to exchange information, eCW also decreases a provider's overhead. Physicians could ePrescribe medicines, avoid duplicate prescriptions, reduce costs related to chart pulls, transcriptions, etc. More importantly it offers patient care with accurate information that could be exchanged seamlessly and securely beyond the walls of a clinic or hospital. As per latest information eCW is used by 25000 providers and is well poised to leverage any regulations that may arise from stimulus packages arising out of "The American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009 and the HITECH Act". It is a CCHIT2008 certified product in both ambulatory and child health for its EMR Version 8.0. It complies effectively w ith submission of reports on clinical quality measures. As per usage reports (health technology review), eCW is easy to familiarize with and takes about less time. It supports remote connections to access charts through Virtual Private Network. It can operate in connected and disconnected modes leveraging the latest in technologies. Wireless operations are supported at a provider's desk. A business optimizer helps to generate accurate reports. The user interface is intuitive and easy to navigate. Another competing EMR product is from NextGen Health Information Systems. While this EMR system also meets fundamental meaningful usage criteria like CCHIT certification, ePrescription, secure exchange of patient information and clinical quality measures, it stands out with respect to many others in its use of pre-defined templates catering to multiple practice specialties. This provides additional quality with respect to maintaining standard documentation formats for patient information exchange. Also ePrescription module validates with patient allergies, their existing medications and alerts physicians appropriately. True to its name, NextGen Advantage offers recording facilities for health care outcomes and assists in "Pay for Performance" programs. Its custom work flow