It’s past time to adopt electronic methods of record keeping
The case for speeding up the adoption of information technology to improve pediatric health care was the topic of an article published in the January 2009 issue of Pediatrics.
Lisa Simpson, MB, BCh, MPH, FAAP, of the Child Policy Research Center at Cincinnati Children’s, wrote that “it is past time” to adopt electronic methods of record-keeping to improve the care of children.
Despite the promise of information technology to improve quality and efficiency in care and despite the goal of an electronic medical record (EMR) for every US patient by 2014, adoption of EMRs has been slow.
Adoption rates vary by size of practice, specialty and age of physicians. Larger practices and younger physicians are more likely to go the route of electronic records.
Simpson described the tremendous potential of information systems to improve productivity, quality, and efficiency, particularly in children’s health. But despite what she describes as “the enormous impact that the use of health information technology (HIT) can have on the quality of health care for children,” only 49% of children’s hospitals use EHRs and only 36% use clinical decision support.
There are challenges, Simpson notes, some of the most pressing for pediatric practices being cost and systems that are not designed for a pediatric population. Compounding the problem is that pediatricians who have adopted EHRs experience a lack of integration between systems - systems that do not “talk to each other” and that hinder rather than enhance efficiency.
The slow pace of moving to electronic records has led some experts to predict that it will take until 2024 to see widespread adoption, a full 10 years beyond the target.
Despite challenges, Simpson states that the EHR is the bedrock on which improving the quality of pediatric health care will be built. She recommends that health information technology be designed around specific care improvement projects.
“It is time, and in many ways past time, to exploit more fully the potential for health information systems to improve child and adolescent health and health care,” Simpson said.
This work was supported in part by the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Research Foundation and in part by a grant from the All Children’s Hospital Research Foundation.
