Electronic Medical Records Implementation - 10 things to consider

Electronic Medical Records (EMR) is one of the most popular terminology in Healthcare industry from quite a long time now and before I touch on 10 things one should consider before EMR implementation, let me elaborate an EMR.

From the name itself one may understand EMR is an electronic record that keeps patients information, medical investigations and history. To add on more I would further define EMR as patient record that can be electronically exchangeable and readable from anywhere around the globe and trustable when you as a doctor visit that record for further investigation.

But as an implementation decision maker, the curiosity would be to understand how I evaluate and what kind of facilities I should look forward to from the EMR vendor.

Here I go with my 10 findings about EMR implementation:-

1. Records should be securely exchangeable over the web.
2. HIPAA act guidelines on privacy, security, transactions and code sets should have been followed to develop an EMR solution.
3. HL7 protocol should be implemented for message exchanges.
4. Choosing the right delivery model for your need example Software as a Service (SaaS) or traditional ASP model.
5. Portability of the records is an important factor for implementing EMRs. One should not always depend on internet for accessing medical records instead they may carry the record in plug and play media as well.
6. The architecture of EMR software should be extendable so that it may accommodate frequent changes in the medical world.
7. Collaboration between practitioner, other clinical staff and patient should be there for ease of patient’s usage.
8. Patient should be taking control of their data so that privacy of medical records are maintained.
9. Apart from demographic and diagnostic information EMR solution may also take care of patient drug reminders, patient bills and claims info.
10. Last but not the least; by investing in an EMR solution, one should get high returns on investment by reducing paper work and making seamless process integration.

I hope this gives an insight of Electronic Medical Records and 10 things that anyone may consider for evaluating and implementing EMRs.