Teaching Med Students About EMR

One important point is to let them know you get out of it what you put in—I work as a provider (NP) who works in the IT office to train and help the providers and nursing staff. Too many providers look at it as a glorified word processor instead of using the EMR to input data that can be later reported on or analyzed. For example we have some providers who have never entered the patients’ diagnoses into the “problem list” and instead just copy and paste the list they made in the previous note. Because the dx are not in a data set and instead are merely text in a note…we cannot recover, analyze or report on that data. If you don’t put the patients’ meds in the record and use escribe capabilities, you can”t get the full function of the EMR to show you medication reactions or contraindications. If you don”t use the Health Maintenance Planning function, you don’t get the capability of being reminded when the patient needs a HgA1c, mammo or PSA. If you don”t want to take the time and effort to initially input this information, then you might as well just dictate or get a word processor. I know it’s time consuming…I implemented an EMR in a smaller office…but in the long run it will be worth it.

John, I will give you a few answers on the granular question based upon our customer’s experiences:
1) Patient recall. If you have meds entered, for example, you can easily find and contact patients on that med. Health maintenance is another area – if it is being maintained, you will know the patient is due for a blood test, mammogram, etc. Not only does this produce revenue but it also produces better patient care.
2) Better coding. By using data fields, most EHRs can provide coding assistance. Many providers find that this allows them to confortably code at a higher level. They are providing the higher level of care already but many don’t know the coding rules well enough or don’t document well enough to be confortable coding (without the EHR’s assistance) at the correct level.
3) Computing power. A computer is usually faster and more reliable with data. For example, if vitals or other flowsheet type data has been entered as data, most EHRs can quickly produce a graph or matrix of the values over time and such graphs may provide a lot of insight into the patient’s progress. There’s not a good way to do this if the chart is just a bunch of text.

I am in a grant writing class in a small college in Lewisburg, West Virginia. We are writing a grant to obtain funding for an EMR computer system to teach students in nursing and other heath care related subjects to be able to understand and use the technology that will soon be required by law. I am not necessarily a student in a health care related field myself although my field, psych/ social work is somewhat related. Can anyone help me in formulating a good proposition toward this goal? Especially anyone who feels they might have benefitted from this type of training in the early stages of thier education. Thanks.

It would be good if the Med Student were look at EMR/EHR with a view toward disease profiling. PFT’s, labs, imaging, Physical Examination, History elements….when taken separately may have a key factor that may indicate the diagnosis. But taken in groupings or constellations may help in developing diagnostic acuity. Likewise, after the diagnosis, treatment modalities can be grouped and tracked for success.