Right now,  healthcare organizations have to go through some pretty tricky maneuvers to link patient data across varied systems and settings.  It’s possible to connect patient info electronically through database hacks, but more often than not, matching patients to clinical data gets done by hand.

Given the insane complexity of the existing system, would it make sense to create a national patient identification number for every U.S. patient?  The question is worth revisiting, given the immense level of error and wasted time generated by the existing system. After all, not only would putting an NPI in place make it easier to track patients within a hospital or health system, it would simplify the rollout of HIEs dramatically, wouldn’t it?

Dr. Robert Rowley of EMR vendor Practice Fusion notes that the biggest enemies of establishing a National Patient Identifier are privacy advocates who feel that an NPI would expose patients to greater risk of breaches or misuse of data.

But is that a realistic concern? Probably not. I agree with Dr. Rowley, who asserts that it’s hard to imagine that PHI would be at greater risk simply because of how it’s indexed.  As he notes, PHI breaches are nearly always often haphazard affairs in which a laptop is stolen than Big Government or corporate conspiracies. (If you’re afraid the government is covertly siphoning your health data off to study it, not having an NPI won’t protect you, anyway.)

No, the real barrier to this kind of administrative simplification measure is time, money and resources, the same barriers that hold back any other proposed HIT project.  It’s hard to imagine the resources that would be involved in instituting such a system — the idea makes my head hurt — and I have to assume it’d be several years before it was anything like mature.

Still, it’s good to bear in mind that at least some members of the public are afraid that creating an NPI would compromise their privacy. If the only barrier to improving patient matching in our EMRs is technical, that’s one thing — but if it’s patient fears, that’s another thing entirely. Sometimes, it’s good to remember that most of the world doesn’t think like a health IT exec.

In every situation online it seems like at some point someone takes the business model as deep as it goes and then someone just finally says, “Let’s make it free.” Readers of this site will be familiar with the leading Free EHR companies Mitochon and Practice Fusion (both advertisers on this site). They both seem to be doing really well and are working on some really interesting business models.

With my familiarity with the Free EHR business model, I was intrigued when I read about HealthTap’s model for basically providing an online medical visit for free. This was particularly interesting since I knew that HealthTap had received $11.5 million in funding recently.

Andy Oram summarizes what HealthTap is trying to solve really well:

In this digital age, HealthTap asks, why should a patient have to make an appointment and drive to the clinic just to find out whether her symptoms are probably caused by a recent medication? And why should a doctor repeat the same advice for each patient when the patient can go online for it?

Plus, he makes two important observations of what HealthTap has found:
1. Doctors will take the time to post information online for free.
2. Doctors are willing to rate each other.

It’s pretty interesting when you think about how many doctors visits could be saved using something like HealthTap. On face, I’d think that a site like this wouldn’t make much sense. Although, as I think back on my medical experiences I can think of about a dozen or so times where I tapped into my physician friends before going to the doctor. Basically, I wanted to know if going to the doctor would be worth my time or not. In about 90% of those cases I ended up not going to the doctor since the doctor wouldn’t have really been able to do much for me anyway.

As I think through these experiences, I realize that many people aren’t lucky enough to be like me and have lots of physician friends around to ask the casual medical question. I could see how HealthTap could fill that role.

One key to this model is that it doesn’t always replace the visit to the physician. In fact, in a few cases I was told that I’d need an X-ray and that I better go see the doctor. In that case I was more likely to go to the physician since I knew I needed to get something done. I already knew the physician would do something for me when I went so I didn’t have the fear that they just tell me to take some Tylenol and be careful with it.

I’m not quite sure if doctors would be glad to actually have only people that are sick visiting their office or not. Maybe they enjoy the break of the easy patient that doesn’t require any effort on their part.

I think there are still questions about the quality of information that patients will get on HealthTap. This is going to be the most interesting issue to follow. No doubt they’re going to be toeing a fine line called medical advice. However, whether it’s HealthTap or some other online source that someone likely finds through Google, people are going to be looking for this kind of health information online. The idea of a free online medical visit sounds good to me.

Let’s also not be surprised if the Free EHR vendors eventually get into online visits as well. Seems like a natural progression for them to offer this service if they wanted to go that direction. From what I understand they have plenty on their plates right now, but a few years from now it could get pretty interesting.

The holiday season is officially upon us, or so said both of my daughters after they saw Santa Claus conclude the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. Black Friday and Cyber Monday have come and gone – not unnoticed by the average American consumer if recently released retail figures are any indication. The economy seems on the verge of a slight upswing, if our holiday spending this early in the season is any indication.

How does healthcare fit into all this? Two holiday headlines recently caught my eye. The first, “Apple Breaks Black Friday Record,” notes that iPad sales “surged 68%” that particular day, breaking the company’s own purported predictions that it would achieve Black Friday sales four times higher than normal. The second, “Mobile Healthcare and Medical App Downloads to Reach 44 Million Next Year, Rising to 142 Million in 2016,” makes the prediction that “[a]cceptance of new healthcare practices like remote patient monitoring will come directly from consumers becoming engaged in mHealth through the smartphone.”

Forty-four million medical app downloads next year might not be such a high number to reach when you take Apple’s record one-day iPad sales into consideration. Physicians and healthcare consumers alike seem to not only be jumping onto the tablet bandwagon, but gearing up to race it to the finish line as well.

So now that we’ve established the healthcare connection, what’s all this got to do with EMRs? Will these predictions and likely outcomes coincide with an upswing in mobile EMR app development? As of yesterday, 60 apps popped up when I searched for “EMR” apps for the iPad in the iTunes store. Forty-seven results came up for “EHR,” many of them the same. I’ll be interested to see what this number is six months and then a year from now.

As this blog has well documented for some time now, healthcare’s love affair with the iPad was a slow burn at first, but has now become fast and furious. I can only imagine that EMR developers will take their relationships with the iPad to the next level in record time just to meet customer demand. While I won’t necessarily be waiting with baited breath for Practice Fusion’s launch next year of its iPad app, I will definitely check it out while at HIMSS, where I assume they’ll give it a Vegas-style launch.

I’d love to hear from physicians as to how inundated the market is likely to become with these types of technologies. And aside from EMR/EHR apps, will mobile health downloads really take off as predicted? Share your own predictions in the comments below.

Full Disclosure: Practice Fusion is an advertiser on this site, but they didn’t pay Jennifer to mention their iPad app. In fact, I’m not even sure if Jennifer knows they’re an advertiser.

I was talking to a physician friend during the week, and getting his take on EMR implementation. He would dearly like to implement an EMR in his practice. However, the major roadblocks he’s experiencing are in terms of costs. The quotes he has received for EMR implementation runs close to 80K. If he bills patients 500K a year, if he does not implement an EMR solution at all, the differential on the Medicare rebates in the first year would be 1 percent of $500,000, which is $5000, which is a number he says he can live with. If he implements an EMR, his two physician practi ce stands to make $88,000 from Medicare (they don’t see many Medicaid patients). In other words, if he spends 80K for his practice, or shells out 40K personally, he stands to gain $44,000. If on the other hand, he maintains status quo, he loses just $5000. Given the pain of choosing an EMR and EMR implementation, he’s probably better off doing nothing, he believes. And let’s not forget, it’ll be live people working with an EMR system, and productivity will actually take a hit before rising slowly back to pre-EMR levels, as this Feb post by Robert Rowley on Practice Fusion’s blog shows.

In other words, there are monetary incentives but sometimes just don’t make real-world sense.

This same math would look a lot different in a multi-physician practice. The same EMR implementation cost would be spread over a larger base, and more of the incentive money would actually reach the physician.

Which brings us to Practice Fusion. On this blog and elsewhere, Practice Fusion has got a lot of press (Full Disclosure: Practice Fusion is an advertiser on this site), not all of it positive.  Not being a medical practitioner, and never having used any EMR personally, my idea of how Practice Fusion stacks up functionally against other EMRs is pretty much second-hand info gleaned from reviews (John had a recent post on Black Book rankings. It’s interesting to me that Practice Fusion shows up in only the 1-Physician Practice rankings among the top 20.) There are those that caution the model of free. There’s also some debate whether a one-size-fits-all approach will benefit every kind of practice. But just based on its economic model, Practice Fusion is a system I would at least recommend my friend look into.

I still remember the first time I heard about Practice Fusion offering a Free EHR. My first response was, “Really?” Of course, having Practice Fusion as an advertiser, being on stage at the Practice Fusion User Group meeting and a number of other interactions with other Free EHR vendors like Mitochon Systems (also an advertiser) has opened my eyes into the real business model behind the “Free EHR” software.

As I thought on the Free EHR business model, I wondered whether some EHR vendor will come out and actually pay doctors to use their EHR software. Yes, that’s right…

An EHR Vendor that Pays Doctors to use EHR.

I haven’t seen one yet, but I could see it happening. It’s not a business model that I would navigate, but I wonder how the Free EHR vendors would react if a well funded venture backed EHR company came out and offered to pay doctors to use their software. Basically, this new company would be doing to the Free EHR vendors what Free EHR vendors did to the rest of the EHR industry.

Would someone really have the moxie to do such a move?

Would the ads, research or other revenue models play out so well that someone could pay doctors to use an EHR?

I’m not talking about the government paying doctors to use an EHR. That’s a different thing all together. Maybe the EHR vendor that does it could be one that’s a sinking ship and making a last ditch effort to somehow monetize their EHR since their EHR software is great, but their EHR marketing is lacking. What better way to improve the marketing of your EHR than paying doctors to use it?

As most of you know, I don’t often point out individual vendors all that much. However, on occasion I get something sent to me that I think could add to the conversation around various EHR software. I got one of those emails from long time reader, Carl Bergman. He chose to no longer be a Practice Fusion consultant and wanted to share the issues he had with the current Practice Fusion EHR product.

I haven’t had the time lately to be able to dig into Carl’s comments myself, so that I could make an assessment of his comments about the Practice Fusion EHR. However, in the interest of sharing both sides of the story I asked Practice Fusion to comment on Carl’s thoughts on their EHR software. So, below you’ll find Carl and Practice Fusions comments.

As with most things in life, take everything you read in this post with a grain of salt and evaluate what each side says for yourself. Either way, I think it could start a helpful discussion for those considering the Practice Fusion EHR.

Letter sent from Carl Bergman to Practice Fusion:

I have been a certified Practice Fusion Consultant for several months. I’m writing to ask that you remove me as a PF consultant.

I have given this decision a great deal of thought, but I do not believe that I can market PF in good conscious. This is not due in any way to how I have been treated, nor is it any reflection on the support that PF offers to its consultants, which is considerable.

Rather, it is based on what I believe are important, missing product features. This lack of features makes it impossible for me to recommend PF to any of the leads that you have generously shared with me. (Please note, I have not and will not approach any of those leads due to your referral.)

I was initially attracted to PF due to its web basis, ease of use and, simple set up and good support. However, as I went through PF I saw that it was lacking in four important areas: Workflow, Billing, Security and Reporting.

Workflow. Each patient in a medical practice presents a different set of circumstances, attributes and issues. These require that the practice be able to respond in a concerted and orchestrated way. PF lacks this ability. Specifically:

Appointment Type. PF has six fixed appointment types, New, Recurring, etc. They may not be changed, deactivated or added to. Appointment duration is set separately for each appointment. An appointment’s specifics are kept in a note.

Appointments are key to a practice’s workflow. For example, PF has a wellness appointment type. However, there is no ability to link the appointment type to look for outstanding labs before the appointment is set. Nor can appointment type reserve a room or assign a tech to take vitals, etc., as part of an exam. As a result, a practice is left to its own, non traceable, ad hoc methods for preparing for and carrying out the exam.

Shared Task List. When a practitioners decides on a course of treatment, this can set a number of things in motion:
• Labs
• Rx
• Recurring Appointments
• Procedures
• Referrals
• Billing

Each of these also is an assignment to someone else to carry out a portion of the plan. While PF has lists for a patient and individual task lists for each person, it does not have an overall view of pending tasks so a manager can see bottlenecks or assign workloads.

Security. PF has four fixed levels of security: Staff, Nurse, NP/PA and PA. Users are assigned to one or more of these levels and optionally as administrators. As with appointment types, the categories may not have their attributes modified or may new ones be added.
I found a definition of the categories in the Support Forum/Getting Started, which defines different user’s edit rights. It is silent about how, if at all, access is limited. Apparently, any user may view all parts of a record. Allowing any user to view anything in an EMR is a dangerous policy because it allows confidential information, such as an AIDS test result, to be known by those who have no need to know it.
Billing. PF includes elements, such as insurance plans, copays, etc., that are usually associated with practice management and billing systems, so it is surprising that it does not include billing as well. Instead, it integrates with third party billing systems, such as Karo.

I have long been biased against systems that tie an EMR from one vendor with billing from another. No matter how well designed, the attempt to integrate two different data structures just doesn’t work well. While PF states that is it fully integrated with Karo, an on line subscription based billing system, but neither site has much detail on the integration much less a data model. I think a user should also know what, if any, terms, relationship, contract, etc., exist between PF and Karo or other billing services.

Aside from detracting from the free nature of PF, the question of the degree of integration is major. For example, who is responsible for the interface’s operation PF or Karo?

Is a demographic change in either reflected in the other? From what I read in the PF Community Forum, the answer is no. I would like to know whose reporting module, if either, can access the combined data from the two systems?

Also, if I use Karo, does that mean I have to set up a separate security system. To look at billing do I have to go from PF and log into Karo?

Reporting. A major advantage of an EMR over a manual system is not only the ability to find and retrieve a specific record, but also the ability to find and report on a selected set as well. For example, if the FDA notifies physicians that they should review all cases of Crone’s disease that are more than three years old who are on a specific dose of a particular antibiotic, PF could not do this.

PF’s reports are limited to searching and reporting on specific topics. In this, it compares unfavorably to a host of other EMRs on the market. If it did have a well developed reporting function, it could make up for some of its lack of workflow abilities, but it does not. This lack of reporting ability when combined with the lack of an internal billing function is a deal killer.

I regard each of the issues that I’ve listed to be a major problem any one of which would cause me to be skeptical of a product. Taken as a whole, and I am aware of the wide adoption of PF, I find that I cannot recommend PF as an EMR.

Carl Bergman
President
SilverSoft, Inc.

And Practice Fusion’s response:

Here’s some notes back. In general, Carl doesn’t seem to have a very deep understanding of the product. A failure on our part, perhaps, but these answers are easily given from our support team:

- Appointment type: EHR accounts come with six default appointment types, but any Admin level user is free to create their own to match their workflow. This setting is under the “admin” tab in the EHR.

- Task list: Each practice manages the passing back and forth of tasks a little bit differently. Most use the secure message feature to send follow-up, billing, lab messages, etc. A practice manager could review these messages or, more easily, could use the Live Activity Feed to see where there are bottlenecks. Since most of our practices are small (under 10 doctors) this doesn’t seem to be a big issue.

- Security: Each user has just one level of permission inside the EHR. Their individual login dictates the level of access they have. It is certainly not true than any user has the same access rights to any record. Plus, our activity feed gives an added level of transparency where you can see exactly who has accessed what, any actions they’ve taken, etc. That’s a unique Practice Fusion feature. However, it is a great suggestion to add more customization to these edit levels, that’s a popular request from our users as well and we have it on our development roadmap.

- Billing: We have the opposite bias from Carl here. We believe that being billing agnostic gives Practice Fusion users a great deal more flexibility in how they choose to manage their billing and an easier transition to EHR since they don’t have to change their billing process at the same time. Kareo is just one option that we provide our users, they are free to use whichever biller then would like. Their low-cost, integrated billing software is popular with our users. The integration today is fairly light, but we are working on ways to make it a more robust connection.

- Reporting: Practice Fusion does have some basic reporting features built in to the EHR today. For example, the reporting feature has assisted doctors with managing the Darvocet recall and with identifying H1N1 high-risk patients. The Crohn’s (note the spelling) disease example he gives would actually be fairly easy to run within PF. You would just do a report on ICD-9 code 555.9 with the date range set and then filter the resulting patients based on prescription (or run a second Rx report and merge). I don’t have any Crohn’s patients in my test account, so I ran a report on chronic migraine instead, below. However, we are in the process of upgrading the reporting feature for both Meaningful Use and our own planned enhancements.

There you have it. I’ll let you be the judge for yourself. Plus, I’m interested to hear what other Practice Fusion users have to say about the various opinions stated in this post. One thing that Practice Fusion has going for them is they at least don’t charge anything for their EHR. So, it’s not like a doctor using it can complain that they didn’t get what they paid for.

I have a feeling that this conversation will continue in the comments. See you there.

Full Disclosure: Practice Fusion is an advertiser on EMR and EHR. Although, I’d provide the same opportunity to any EHR vendor that would like to respond to comments I get about them.

This is the first in a series of EMR, EHR and Healthcare IT interviews that will be done on EMR and HIPAA and EMR and EHR. The full EMR interview with Dr. West can be found on the new EMR, EHR and Healthcare IT interviews website. The following is a summary of that interview written by Kathy Bongiovi.

If you’re a doctor, nurse, practice manager, EHR consultant, CEO or executive of an EHR vendor, etc with EMR experience that’s interested in being interviewed, let us know on our Contact Us page.

In a recent interview with Dr. West, an endocrinologist in Washington D.C. and blogger at Happy EMR Doctor, the doctor discussed his experience in finding an EMR capable of fulfilling the needs of his specialized practice and, at the same time, saving him time. Dr. West discussed the arduous process of going from a failed to a successful EMR system.

His first experience with EMR was frustrating and he ultimately ended his relationship with the vendor. West heard other horror stories regarding failed EMRs and was convinced if he kept trying he would find an EMR that would fit his needs.

Dr. West advises other doctors and healthcare professionals to avoid rushing into any relationship with an EMR vendor and to make sure that when they sign a contract, first make sure the contract has a “satisfaction and money-back guarantee”. He suggests that anyone searching for an EMR, should find a vendor willing to let them try out their product for at least a month with no strings attached. Dr. West adds that the doctor or healthcare professional should also make sure there are not a lot of very specific hardware requirements in case the provider needs to change vendors.

Although some studies suggest a decrease in productivity with EMR systems because of a lack of customization for given specialties, West is not suffering from any of those issues and gives the credit to his EMR, Practice Fusion which is free and web based. The doctor has been able to customize templates to fit his specialty in endocrinology and is therefore able to see patients faster and complete their notes by the close of business. The benefits of customized templates, in his practice, allow “a more uniform approach to common problems, such as diabetes and thyroid nodules.” He goes on to explain that the result is a “well-defined path of questions designed to gather the most meaningful and relevant information” from the patient.

An EHR thorn in Dr. West’s side is his decision to not participate in the government’s EHR incentive plan. He thought he’d pursue the path to meaningful use, but after a great deal of frustration he abandoned his pursuit of the government’s EHR incentive money. West stated he may blog about his inner struggle with this issue. If so, his comments will appear in his blog Happy EMR Doctor.

The interview also touched upon Medicare’s recent practice of eliminating consultation codes and the consequences of this practice. By eliminating codes, Medicare has restricted providers’ ability to bill in certain instances. This has led to Dr. West and others turning away Medicare patients thereby restricting some patients’ access to care.

Dr. West’s EMR success should give all doctors and healthcare professionals the incentive to conquer the EMR puzzle and regain some of their personal time now spent handling and maintaining paper charts.

Full Disclosure: Practice Fusion is an advertiser on this site. However, they didn’t know we were doing this interview with Dr. West. Also, Happy EMR Doctor, Dr. West’s blog, is part of the Healthcare Scene blog network.

I’m about to make a big announcement about the iPad. Something that every iPad loving doctor will be happy to know about. It’s a simple announcement, and something many of you probably already know: Every EMR software vendor out there is now available on the iPad.

That’s right, you can pretty much run any and every of the 300+ EMR companies software on an iPad. All it takes is an iPad, a cell or WiFi internet connection and some form of remote desktop application. There you go, I solved all the EMR companies iPad strategy problems.

Practice Fusion sent out a press release recently about support of the iPad for their Free EHR. In the press release they highlight a number of the benefits of access to an EMR on the iPad and they describe the use of the EMR iPad model that I talk about above. They use the remote desktop app for mobile devices called LogMeIn Ignition. $29.95 and you can connect to your computer from your iPad. Not to mention that it also support Android and Windows. Yes, that’s right, I guess we could also say that every EMR software is available on Android and Windows phones and tablets as well. Of course, there are also some free RDP options as well, but probably aren’t quite as easy to configure.

Now, I’m sure the purest out there are going to come and say that there’s a lot of difference between a remote session to your computer than a native iPad EMR application. They’re right. In some ways, the remote connection to your computer is better. There’s no new EMR interface you have to learn. You have remote access to all the files and programs on your main computer. You have all the preferences you’re use to having at your desk. I could go on, but there’s certainly some benefits to remotely accessing your computer on an iPad.

Some might argue that the latency (Translated: slowness) of a remote session could be a major issue. I think these comments are from people on super slow connections and/or people who haven’t used the latest remote desktop sessions. Remote access has come a long way and the experience of using a computer remotely is almost as good as being at the computer itself.

The more important argument that I’ve left out is actually the EMR user interface. The problem with most EMR user interfaces is that they were designed with a mouse and keyboard as the input devices. The keyboard can generally be overcome with good templates, voice recognition, the iPad keyboard, etc. However, the mouse is a more difficult challenge since the precision of the mouse is so much better than your finger (This is the true fat finger issue).

Point being that while you can certainly access your EMR remotely on the iPad, it’s going to be important to know how well your EMR software is designed for a touch screen interface. Spacing of elements in your EMR, size of buttons and a number of other design elements can drastically change your experience using a touch screen interface. Plus, that doesn’t even cover the unique touch screen gestures that are available like swiping, 2 finger taps, etc.

Yes, it is fair to say that EVERY EMR software out there can be run on an iPad. However, that definitely doesn’t mean that you will want to run that EMR software on the iPad. The good thing is the cost to try your EMR software on the iPad is really low. Once you’ve tried it out, let me know your experience so that others can learn as well.

At least that’s the case that was made in this blog post on the Software Advice website. The post is a few months old which is centuries in the tech world, but I have to disagree with them on their take that EMR vendors are slow to move their products to the iPad platform. In fact, I mentioned in their comments that I think every single EMR vendor has an iPad strategy.

They do get it right that doctors are adopting the iPad at a really dramatic pace. Here’s my reasons why it’s been so popular:
1. Battery life that lasts a full shift
2. 3G and Wireless Connectivity
3. Intuitive interface
4. $500 price point

We’re still waiting on some enterprise features that it seems like the Blackberry Playbook is trying to implement for healthcare. However, I’m pretty sure they’ll get there in time or someone will create an app that will create those features anyway.

Back to the iPad, the article only states 2 companies that have an iPad EMR offering. There are many more than that. I’ve seen some from Practice Fusion, GE, and VitalHealth to just name a few.

What I haven’t yet seen is how well doctors like the use of their EMR iPad interface. Is it really that usable for a doctor doing his rounds? Does it work well for clinical documentation? Is it a nice compliment to a desktop environment?

Sadly, I still can’t give my first hand account of using an EMR on an iPad. I got my refund from HIMSS since despite all the free iPad giveaways I came home without one. Oh well, the iPad 2 is out now and it would have been a shame to only won a first generation iPad. I’m told by Christmas there may even be an iPad 3, but I digress.

What might even be more interesting than EMR use on an iPad is the other creative ways that people are using iPads in healthcare. For example, I’ve heard of people using an iPad as a check in device for their clinics. There’s something cool about handing over an iPad instead of a clipboard for your patients to fill out their paperwork. I’m sure some patients would hate it, but I for one would be much happier feeling out the stack of paperwork electronically.

For years, public health officials and health leaders have been sounding the praises of EMRs, arguing that patients would enjoy safer, more effective care once providers went digital.

For a while, it was a tough sell, with surveys repeatedly suggesting that patients were suspicious that their data would be compromised or shared without their permission. Others seemingly just weren’t impressed with the concept.

Of late, however, it seems that the public has caught up, and may be well ahead of the provider community in its enthusiasm for digitizing medical records.  According to a new survey by GfK Roper, 78 percent of patients believe an EMR will allow doctors to give them better care whose doctors use EMRs believe that it helps the doctor provide better care.

According to Practice Fusion, an EMR vendor which backed the survey, patients are eager to get e-mailed appointment reminders, have their prescriptions sent electronically and view appointments online.

But wait a minute. Even if backing by a vendor hasn’t tilted the results, this kind of study doesn’t necessarily mean that patients really want an EMR as such.

My guess is that the folks surveyed by Roper have caught wind of a few cool things that more advanced medical practices and hospitals are doing (such as telemedicine, making test results accessible online and appointment scheduling) and they want in. Everybody likes convenience, no?

Somehow, I doubt they’re thinking about care coordination, sharing of medical records from one institution to another across an HIE, integrating data from various departments within a facility, creating data warehouses to do quality studies and so on.  They’re just starting to get a feel for the bells and whistles, some of which don’t even require an EMR to execute.

No, the truth is that it most Americans will never understand the clinical problems EMRs are designed to solve, as most will never delve into issues like risk analysis and patient safety management.  So their interest will inevitably flag.

But for now, we’ve got their attention. This is a moment — the EMR’s “15 minutes of fame” — in which the buzz is so intense that even consumers are getting excited.

Providers, now is the time:  Reach out and educate consumers on the value of your EMR investment while they’re still interested.  This moment may not come again.

UPDATE: As you’ll see above, Practice Fusion was kind enough to correct my understanding of a key part of of the study.  The idea that patients whose doctors already have EMRs in place are happy about it is different, of course, than saying that consumers generally want doctors to hurry up and adopt one. That being said, I’d still argue that even these patients are at a gee-whiz stage, and that their enthusiasm won’t last long. What do you think?