Originally published September 26 2005
Electronic medical records could allow for quicker, more cost-effective access
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The journal Health Affairs claims that while electronic medical records could make visits to the doctor quicker and more affordable, offices are slow to adopt the technology because savings are passed to insurers and government more than to individual offices.
Electronic medical records could improve patient care and possibly save billions of dollars, yet many doctors aren't investing in the technology because they may not reap the savings --- insurers and the government will, researchers report.
It's one of several pitfalls blamed for slowing adoption of computerized medicine in a collection of provocative, sometimes conflicting studies published Wednesday in the journal Health Affairs.
Usually, they're hospital- or doctor-specific, not easily transferred and read by other health care providers.
The ultimate goal of electronic medical records is a nationwide network, allowing quick access to, say, the medical history of a patient lying unconscious in an emergency room far from home.
Other benefits could include paperless prescriptions to cut drug errors and software linking patient records to care guidelines and automatic checkup reminders.
RAND researchers set up a statistical model to predict the possible savings from such health care improvements and from improved business efficiency, such as eliminating redundant care and shortening hospital stays, if 90 percent of hospitals and doctors ultimately adopted such a network.
A conservative estimate came to $81 billion a year, $77 billion from improved efficiency and $4 billion from reduced medication errors and side effects, RAND lead researcher Richard Hillestad said.
"The potential savings would not be realized immediately," and doctors and hospitals making the investments would get fewer of the profits, the study cautioned.
Instead, Medicare would receive about $23 billion of the potential savings each year, and private insurers about $31 billion a year, he concluded, saying those predictions justify more government funding of computerized medicine.
Among 14 single or small-group physician practices, the average spent about $44,000 per full-time provider to establish an electronic medical records system and about $8,500 a year to maintain it, money recouped in business savings within 2� years.
Those were averages; some practices didn't recoup the investments for years.
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