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Guest author:  Karen Burton

Karen Burton

A recent survey showed that 73% of physicians believe that health IT will improve the quality of their patient care in the long term. Yet, many obstacles still exist that may prevent healthcare from becoming more connected. These include:

  • Nearly 60% of physicians don’t currently use mobile technology for clinical purposes. Of those who don’t, 44% cited a lack of cooperation in the workplace as the primary reason.
  • Only half of physicians aged 60 or older have implemented EHRs that are ready to show meaningful use (MU). The future appears brighter, however, with 71% of doctors aged 25-39 having MU-ready EHRs. Of those who have implemented, 49% will change this year – which indicates that as physicians experience EHR, they demand more user friendly, productive applications.
  • Smaller physician groups are less likely to have EHRs, with about 30% of solo practitioners having adopted them. Larger groups are more likely, however, with 82% of groups with 10 or more physicians having deployed EHR.
  • About 30% of doctors communicate with patients using emails or texts, and 14% allow patients to access medical records with a mobile device.

Getting ready for EHR

We published an ebook discussing the  potential barriers and solutions to get you started on the road to EHR adoption.

What do you think? Is an increase in health IT ripe? Or is it just hype, and should healthcare providers be careful with implementing these new technologies?

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