Electronic Medical Record



Electronic Medical Record

Introduction

An EMR (Electronic Medical Record) is used for representing data related to the patients, usually found stored in form of papers. It includes all the necessary medical information of the patients, ranging from radiology, and pathology to clinical information. All this data is structured in a digital form. The system is effectively designed for the purpose of capturing and representing data regarding the various stages and states of the patients during all the times. It helps in viewing the entire history of a patient without having to trace out any previous medical records of the patients. It also ensures that the doctors, nurses or the physicians for that matter get to view an accurate, legible and appropriate data regarding the patients, (Bates, 2003).

It also ensures that the chances for data repetition are replication is reduced, as there will only be a single file which will be modifiable. This file is always updated to provide the latest developments in the patients' medical records, (Evans, 1999). It is because of this that the issue regarding the lost files can be eliminated, as all the data will be under one record. The extraction of data regarding any patient is thus made easier. It can also provide an insight to the patient's historical trends and show new trends, if any.

In this paper, we will be focusing on the evolution of software application EPIC being used in a medical care organization. We will be discussing on how the processes functioned, prior to the implementation of the software.

Discussion

Epic Care EMR is popularly known around as being a physician-friendly and a fast application with an integrated revenues and access systems to simplify the administration tasks. It tends to improve care with its 'one patient- one record' approach. It is helping patients in millions to access to their records through the same medical charts used by their doctors. It is helping the patients in scheduling and re scheduling their appointments, access to their medical test results and print these results. It simply combines all the patient's medical documents and chart reviews efficiently. It organizes patient's information and helps in guiding coordinated care for various settings pertaining to the physical care, (Hannan, 1996).

Prior to the advent of the software, all the records pertaining to the medical history and trends of the patients were based on paper, entirely. It was a very common method for doing things at medical institutes. Even now, in most parts of the world, medical institutes and places such as; clinics and hospitals don't make a complete use of software and smart database systems for recording data regarding their patients. Even in the United States of America, majority of doctors find it easy to base all the records related to the patients, on papers. This is because the doctors find it easy and find it cheaper to record everything on paper, rather than spending on software and training of the medical staff. However, no matter how easy it ...