What is the alternative to EHR software? Thousands of pages of paper records that is impossible to rapidly search? Just being able to index and search health records is enough to justify the existence of EHR software.
What is the alternative to EHR software? Thousands of pages of paper records that is impossible to rapidly search? Just being able to index and search health records is enough to justify the existence of EHR software.
My ¢2 as someone who works in the space: EHRs are currently mandatory for compliance, reporting, and billing reasons — but completely unnecessary for the practice of medicine.
The first big step towards untangling the gordian knot in my book is pivoting the industry to a capitated payment model, so compensation doesn’t require tying everything back to CPT & ICD codes, or tracking super-anal quality metrics for CMS. Once you make that jump, it’s pretty easy to imagine a lightweight note-taking + file-hosting platform that lets providers document summary data on a patient profile wiki-style, and attach notes to the profile in any arbitrary format using customizable templates. (I’m basically picturing a mashup of Google Drive + Wiki.js + Obsidian features.)
Handling meds, orders, and referrals in a cross-platform way is starting to become a solved problem with FHIR. Tack on modular plugins for each of the above to the patient profile page, and you’ve reinvented the functionality of an EMR in a way that sucks far less and lets users get shit done.