Importance of EMR in the Improvement of Medical Practices

A number of technologically advanced tools and software were developed to improve the way health care is provided to people. From as old as the X-Ray machines to robotic surgery (computer-assisted surgery, robot-assisted surgery), medical practices had been continuously fused with modern technologies to introduce new medical tools and equipments for the proliferation of modern medicine.

One popular equipment which was invented to mitigate or to completely eliminate medical errors caused by wrong medical records is the EMR or the electronic medical records.

What is EMR

EMR, or Electronic Medical Record, is a computerized medical record which is used to quickly store and delivery a patient’s medical record. A popular example of such is a pediatric EMR used by many pediatricians today. It allows quicker and timely retrieval and modification of a patient’s medical record which is unlike that of using a paper-based record.

Advantages of EMR

The main goal why EMR was introduced is to lessen the cost of storing medical records. According to many experts, most countries in the US stores their patient’s record in a highly secured storage space for 7 years, which is why health care institutions pay extra for additional storage used. As for EMR, it would only require a digital storage, such as a hard-disk drive, to store all the information that a patient have had. This can also be stored for more than 10 years (if the storage is maintained properly).

Another reason why EMR was developed other than allowing for quick storage, retrieval and modification of records is that it aims to lessen medical errors which is usually caused by poor legibility or penmanship. Pre-printed forms, the standardization of abbreviations, and standards for penmanship were encouraged to improve reliability of paper medical records.

According to many experts, electronic records, such as a pediatric EMR, help with the standardization of forms, terminology and abbreviations, and data input. Digitization of forms facilitates the collection of data for epidemiology and clinical studies.

Another important factor that made EMR very popular and important medical equipment is that it has the ability to exchange records between different EMR systems. This allows hospitals and different healthcare institutions to quickly deliver a patient’s medical record, such as their medical history, to another healthcare institution. This is particularly important if a new strain of virus was found in a patient in which the information must be sent quickly to a medical laboratory for analysis. For more information visit to our site at http://www.acrendo.com