Why can't every hospital/medical center in the USA adopt an #EHR right about now? 2014 is here, I hope you all are #finedheavily
— Huma Ahmed (@humahmd) March 10, 2014
While I’m sure this tweet will rub many the wrong way, I found it incredibly thought provoking. I have no idea who this person is that tweeted it, but I think that his tweet represents the majority of Americans who know very little about EHR and Health IT.
From a layman’s perspective, in every industry the use of IT has benefited that industry. Those not living in the EHR world just automatically think that by applying IT to something that we’ll see a huge benefit. Those of us in the EHR industry no doubt have a much more nuanced feeling about the benefits of EHR. I’m sure the guy who tweeted above won’t be happy with the meaningful use hardship exemptions which will defer organizations from being #finedheavily.
While I agree with the idea that we need broad EHR adoption, I think we have to be careful trying to rush any EHR implementation. A rushed EHR implementation is far worse than no EHR.