Electronic Health Records EHR Electronic

Electronic Health Records

EHR

Electronic health records are a realization that has been common across the information technology and personal computer markets over the last twenty years or so. The technology capabilities that have become visible over that time frame have greatly increased what people can do with computers but it has also made it a lot harder to get people trained and up to speed on the technology and it has also made it a lot easier to screw things up immensely all at the same time. This reply will cover all of this as it pertains to electronic health records the barriers that exist to getting them used in wide rotation in the hospital and broader healthcare industry.

Challenges in EHR

As noted by the electronic health records assignment that is being completed within this response, implementing EHR can be very formidable and complicated. It has gotten to the point, no matter how specious it may sound, that some people say that there is no benefit to using electronic health records and that could not be farther from the truth. This report will explore why this is the opinion of some and why it is simply wrong (Murphy, 2010).

Based on the resources made available for this assignment as well as the author of this paper's own personal research and observations, problems in EHR implementation fall under one of two major categories. The first is the quality (or lack thereof) of the implementation. The system being set up has to be top notch and attention to detail has to be part and parcel of the setup. This includes the training and educating of the people that will be using the system. This in particular is very important because if the end-users and administrators are not up to speed or are even aloof about what they are doing and why, it will tend to have disastrous effects on the overall setup. After all, when talking about an information archive like an EHR setup, it's garbage in, garbage out (Murphy, 2010).

The other dimension is related but is definitely separate. Some end-users are not only uninformed on how to administer electronic health records, they may actively resist and otherwise undermine the setup and these people need to be identified or even removed if they will not play along. It cannot be denied that, when done properly, electronic health records allows for such a seamless and beautiful result. As such, people that are intentionally or unconsciously undermining the setup need to be fleshed out and corrected (Bates, 2010).