The Immediate Benefits of Switching to Electronic Health Records

benefits of switching to electronic health records

While majority of the healthcare practices have made a shift to Electronic Health Records, a few gun-shy practices (nearly 37% of healthcare providers in the US) still haven’t woken up from their slumber. Here are some of the benefits that these hesitant practices are missing out on:

Less Paperwork and Fewer Storage Issues

EHRs are good news for healthcare providers who are already overburdened by mandatory administrative duties. This means they no longer have to keep a huge cache of paper-based records in their office, and spend a large portion of the workday filling out and processing forms.

With instant storage and retrieval of digital records, healthcare providers may enjoy the benefits of increased efficiency and reduced storage needs.

Increased Quality of Care

With EHRs you can easily exchange elaborate healthcare information about a patient in real time. Complete, accurate and up-to-date information reduces errors and leads to a higher quality of care, say experts.

When it comes to medications, paper based records can sometimes be lost or misinterpreted, leading to errors in prescription or even inappropriate medication being dispensed.

EHR allows healthcare delivery professionals to communicate directly with the pharmacy, reducing errors. Patient safety is also improved, as EHR automatically checks for potentially lethal drug interactions.

Financial Incentives

Yes, implementing EHR is a costly affair for even the most established players in the industry. Fortunately, the government is offering financial incentives to help providers recover from their investment.

Through the Medicare EHR Incentive Program and the Medicaid EHR Incentive Program, eligible healthcare practices can receive incentives for the implementing EHR system.

Increased Efficiency

EHR promotes chart centralized management and offers quicker access to patient information at any point of time. All this allows you to establish better connect with other practices and healthcare delivery professionals to provide more efficient care.

Better Patient Care

As per experts, things that are good for healthcare providers are often good for patients, too. Seamless access to healthcare information means no more time consuming paperwork at each doctor’s or specialist’s office. Every physician will have a detailed record of the tests that were carried out on a patient, along with the details of each treatment. Not just that! Patients are also less susceptible to frauds, as all the information is available in one place. All these leads to better and more accurate patient care, which in fact is the primary objective of every healthcare practices.