A fundamental part of Electronic Health Records (EHR) systems is the ability to share data with other, outside sources. Besides simply capturing in-office work – chart notes, prescription writing, scheduling, and the like – an EHR should connect with the “outside world.” This is the...

Getting Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems to “talk” to each other has been one of the goals of the emerging national Health IT policy. Several of the Meaningful Use criteria for doctors and hospitals, as well as HHS Certification criteria for EHR vendors, are based...

Secure, web-based patient–provider communication tools are dedicated systems designed to support patient–provider and provider–provider electronic communication. They require unique log-in procedures and user identifiers to secure the privacy of such communications, and are often augmented by additional features like appointment scheduling, medication refill processing, viewable...

The use of Electronic Health Records (EHRs) has been quite variable from one specialty to another. Some specialties, like primary care specialties, seem more open to adopting EHRs, while others have had a different adoption experience. Even when adoption barriers – cost, implementation and workflow-disruption...

As Electronic Health Records (EHR) systems become more widespread, issues of poor design, and the consequences of that, take on a higher profile. This is especially true in hospital systems, which often are built using legacy, locally-installed client/server technology, geared to being self-contained (rather than...