Physicians on the problem with EHRs, in their own words
Medical Economics conducted its 2019 EHR Scorecard in October, which included the question to physicians: “In your opinion, what is the biggest problem with EHRs across the marketplace?”Here is a sample of their responses, broken into six categories of criticisms.
Lack of user-friendliness
· “These records are not organized the way doctors have been taught to organize patients’ notes for at least 40 years.”
· “Cumbersome systems, not designed with users in mind.”
· “Have to click too many times to find the information I need. Problem list not set up to be useful clinically, only designed to get ICD codes right.”
Exchanging information with other EHR systems
· “None speak to each other. My office EHR can’t be used by my hospital. It’s ludicrous.”
· “Inability to share information causes profound negative impact on visit flow and workload.”
· “Lack of proper interfaces for import/export of data.”
Impact on productivity
· “My productivity has taken a permanent hit because documentation takes so much longer now.”
· “Productivity killer”
· “Takes longer to enter data to comply with insurance requirements, which takes away efficiency and takes longer to see patients and complete charts.”
Doctor-patient relationship
· “Interferes with doctor-patient interaction because of data entry, too many clicks to search chart, need to ‘capture’ bullet points to bill a certain level of care.”
· “Far too much time on the computer, and less face-to-face time with patients.”
· “They all fail to grasp the most important aspects of the doctor-patient relationship: the physical exam, the questioning of the patient and the ability of the physician to shut up and listen.”
Expense
· “Continued cost to maintain/upgrade. The vendors know we are forced to use EHRs, so they stick it to us.”
· “Contracts and price are not favorable to physicians. The bundling of EHR, practice management and billing leaves physicians vulnerable when not pleased with services.”
· “Cost of systems and maintenance, need to hire additional staff (scribes).”
Systems not designed for patient care
· “EHR is useful for billing and tracking, not caring for people with diseases who don’t fit into a template.”
· “EHRs are intended for billing and for population health. They are not designed to help care for the individual patient.”
· “Seems to be driven mainly by insurers, government and funders’ need to audit and surveil clinicians and not in the interests of providing better patient care.”
