There’s been a lot of talk about the triple aim of healthcare and the need to refocus many of the EHR and healthcare IT solutions on the triple aim. Many of the concepts are really good, but the triple aim is certainly not all encompassing.
This was highlighted really well by this infographic (see below) by Caradigm which suggests a 4th aim that should be added: Improving the work life of health care providers, including clinicans and staff.
The most ironic part of the infographic is the final section which talks about how technology solutions can be used to make providers’ lives better and decrease physician burnout. While I agree that technology solutions could and should help with this problem, the reality is that many of them have just made this problem worse. We could talk about whether the EHR is the whipping boy for regulations, but the EHR definitely is getting the blame for a lot of physician burnout. Will we turn the corner and start seeing technology as an enabler of this 4th aim? Or maybe I should say when will we see this?