By GLENN LAFFEL
Author’s Note: This the second of a 5-part series whose purpose it is to make the case for implementing a widespread, systematic approach to HIT education in medical schools and continuing medical education programs for physicians. A previous post reviewed challenges posed by the HIT Deluge.
Countries around the world are racing to digitize patient medical records. In the US for example, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act allocated $21 billion to an incentive program designed to encourage the “meaningful use” of such systems.
The Federal government’s largesse is based on the premise that EHRs will improve the quality of care and reduce its costs, but the move will impact the health care system in many other ways as well. One area sure to be impacted is the education and training process for new physicians.
What kind of impact can we expect? In some ways, EHRs appear to enhance medical education, but there are as many or more instances in which the impact appears to be negative. Thankfully, careful planning can mitigate most of the collateral damage, a topic to be covered in this series’ next installment. For now, we’ll settle for a review of the good, the bad and the ugly.
