Electronic Medical Records ( EMR ) : Issues and Implementation Perspectives

For many years the electronic medical record has been the holy grail of hospital system integration. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent in attempts to develop effective electronic medical records (EMR) to provide clinical care for patients. The advantages of an EMR are listed as reducing error, streamlining care, and allowing multiple people to provide simultaneous care. Unfortunately, most current EMR implementations are developed without completely understanding the processes that are being automated. In some implementations, there is an effort to first outline the process, and then try to create software that will facilitate the existing process, but this effort is not typically done systematically or with the discipline of an engineer. We will discuss the areas that management systems engineers can facilitate the design and implementation of the EMR, reducing the errors in the current processes and preparing the healthcare system for further improvements.