How many times as a doctor do you ask the same questions over and over again as part of the routine process of taking a history from your patient? And how often as a patient do you have to answer those same questions each time you see a new doctor? How long does this take, given that doctors and patients both complain that there is too little time for the …
Repetition is the curse of the doctor-patient engagement
As a physician, technology cannot replace you, but it can make you more efficient and effective.
This was the message from Richard Satava, MD, who spoke on the future of surgical technology at the recent Seattle Surgical Society Annual Meeting. Dr. Satava’s speech was fascinating as he laid out the future for robotics, remote surgery, internal locomotion actuators, molecular imaging biosurgery, etc. I looked over my shoulder a couple of times …
The Internet is where patients go for pre-visit consultations
Many clinical decisions in older persons are dependent on life expectancy. For example, as life expectancy declines, cancer screening is likely to do more harm than good. Also, persons who have limited life expectancy may want to plan, discuss their values, and consider palliative care approaches of care in addition to care focused on living as long as possible.
But can one actually predict life expectancy accurately in an individual patient? …
Why the prognosis of patients is difficult
Professor Gunter Dueck, is a calm and eloquent german mathematician who’s also the CTO of IBM Germany. He studied mathematics and philosophy and eventually turned out to be a great writer and speaker. Unfortunately he only does so in German, which is why it doesn’t make much sense to post a video of him here.
In a recent talk he gave (German only), he talks about whether a connected and …
Google knows more about certain diseases than physicians ever will
I’ve had the luck to attend medical school in the city of San Francisco during what will be looked back on as the start of transformational change in our health care system. My growing interest in technology and new business models as the disruptive forces behind this change, as well as marriage to a technology entrepreneur, has me frequently rubbing elbows with movers and shakers in the digital health space. …
A guide for entrepreneurs to get a doctor’s attention
In the modern medical environment of unpaid insurance claims, malpractice lawsuits and rushed patient encounters, many doctors feel unmotivated and unhappy.
Could the use of improved healthcare technology make doctors feel motivated and fulfilled again?
The hierarchy of needs
Motivating others is always difficult task. But according to Dan Heath, author of Made to Stick, all employers need to do to effectively motivate employees is get out of the basement – Maslow’s basement …
Motivate physicians through technology
The sore back. The stiff knee. The aching hand. More than 50 million Americans suffer from these and many other forms of noncancerous chronic pain. Treatments recommended for chronic pain include physical therapy, exercise, cognitive behavioral therapy, meditation, medication, a wide range of alternative therapies and other measures. Often it is not easy to tell how effective a treatment is because most patients do not carefully monitor changes in their …
Using a mobile app to help chronic pain
Distance medicine technologies can be disruptive in the way physicians and other care givers interact with patients and with each other and can fundamentally change how patients are able to interact with the entire health care system. This is of increasing relevance as medicine gravitates toward chronic illnesses where diagnosis and treatment are complex and require multi-specialist teams. It also has potential to alleviate some of the effects of the …
Distance medicine will transform medical practice
More and more providers see the value of providing patient portals. In an attempt to be responsive, EMR vendors are providing patient portals that have some limited capabilities (get lab results, email your doctor and possibly fill out a form requesting an appointment). However, just as the ability to design an airplane cockpit is radically different from a car dashboard, so to is designing an EMR geared towards medical professionals …
Designing a friendly patient portal for consumers
I have been using electronic health records now for over 10 years. Like most physicians who have used EHRs, I would not ever go back to a paper-based medical record.
Having said that, it is important to recognize some of the potential problems created by some EHR products. One potential pitfall of some EHRs is the number of steps it takes to find information that is in the system. Yes, it …
Solving information overload in the EHR
With paper exam notes, the doctor and staff record information and the note reflects what they recorded. Unfortunately, EHR based notes may not be as direct.
Many EHR systems store the information that you enter in one way, and offer a variety of presentation and reporting options. The ability of the EHR to offer multiple presentation options is a powerful tool. For example,
You may generate an exam note, referral form, and a …
Why your EHR note may not be accurate
The common perception is that older doctors are more adverse to technology, especially when it comes to electronic medical records.
Recent data, however, says that isn’t true.
According to a study cited in American Medical News, “physicians more than 10 years out of medical school and those with higher patient volumes were more likely than younger and less busy physicians to …
Show doctors the value when it comes to social media and EMRs
Imagine that your neurosurgeon, during surgery, was talking on his cellphone using a headset.
Unthinkable?
Well, no. A recent article in the New York Times cites a case where a patient was left paralyzed and the neurosurgeon was sued, in part, for being distracted. He made 10 personal calls during the operation.
The proliferation of portable electronic devices, smartphones, tablets, and the …
Solving distracted doctoring from smartphones and tablets
ADVERTISEMENT
The term globalization loosely refers to the increasing unification of order. It has been traditionally applied to the economic sector. As the world is progressively intertwined from financial and cultural perspectives, it is not surprising that it is occurring in the medical arena. There have been international professional medical societies for many decades, and the medical device and pharmaceutical industries have consolidated on a global scale.
However, the way medicine is …
Mobile health and the globalization of medicine
It can’t be ignored that dramatic transformation in our healthcare system is imminent. The economy, market forces and increasing political demands will soon force physicians and healthcare professionals to change how we take care of our patients. Just as the days of housecalls are gone, so is our current system of delivering care.
The rising cost of healthcare now has the government and insurance companies placing more emphasis on controlling costs, …
Technological advances can solve our current healthcare crisis
I started working with computers in medicine in 1963. I was a Captain in the United States Army Medical Corps in San Francisco when a Lieutenant Colonel told me to “automate the California Tumor Tissue Registry.”
I said, “Yes, Sir. How would I do that?” He told me to walk across the Presidio parking lot and go into a building that had a big machine in it that is called a …
Health IT has problems, but is worth the price
1. Mobile health technology will increase patient engagement. Most patients do not take the responsibility they should for their own health. They are likely preoccupied with all the stresses of everyday life and might therefore take the ‘I feel good, so I must be’ approach. They possibly mutter these words after wiping their faces, hurriedly walking out of McDonald’s for lunch. Or is it because of mistrust of their physician …
5 reasons why physicians will love mobile health
Our practice went live with our own EMR system in late 2008. For the most part, this was uneventful. The reason for this was mainly due to proper planning. And credit for our implementation plan goes primarily to our administrator, our IT director, and staff members of our appointed EMR committee. Although some of the physicians were an integral part of the committee, we tried our best not to micromanage …
EHR adopters give advice to those considering electronic medical records
Before I took over one of the classes that now teach at the medical school, I asked students why the value of that class was so low. One of the reasons they gave was that it was so hard to do well in the class, and there were so many other things to study, students only put in enough effort to pass. In other words, incentives are only good if …
Give meaningful use value for physicians
Technology adoption is iterative. Here are some suggestions that can help you adopt and morph EHR techniques and processes to fit into your own practice’s workflow.
When it comes right down to it, some are basic learning techniques that can apply to any new situation in the office.
And remember, everyone has something to learn.
Don’t get stuck in your own routine, if a physician finds a work-around that improves a system function …
Tips for a seamless EHR transition
Get free updates delivered free to your inbox.
