Although physician groups have lamented the burden of aggressive Meaningful Use standards on doctors, some practices and health systems in Massachusetts have reported big benefits from incorporating technology into patient-centered care, according to an article from the Worcester Business Journal.
At Worcester-based Reliant Medical Group, for example, patients can use an online portal through their computer or smartphone to access parts of their medical records, schedule appointments and ask for prescription renewals. In addition, patients can securely transmit their self-monitored blood pressures into their health records, as well as receive notifications when they are overdue for certain tests.
The Massachusetts Health Information Highway, otherwise known as the HIway--a state initiative that aims to help healthcare providers share patient information securely amongst one another--is also helping these once-futuristic ideas become part of daily practice. Its future goals include facilitating better care coordination and health-information analysis, the article noted.
These services have already helped Harrington HealthCare System, one of the state's earliest electronic health record adopters, get 94 percent of its affiliated doctors' offices adopt computerized order entry, as well as computerized medication administration and nursing documentation.
It's been a challenge for providers to adopt the electronic systems, according to Harrington's Chief Information Officer Harold Lemieux. But having the data available is already allowing the health system to analyze trends involving patients at both the hospital and doctors' offices, giving it new information about the populations that need special focus, he added.
And regardless of incentive dollars, which many of the organizations profiled in the article have received, health leaders are seeing the value of predictive analytics made possible by using EHRs meaningfully. "It allows us to potentially have early detection of high-risk situations that you may not notice as quickly," Kristin Darby, CIO at St. Vincent's Hospital, told the newspaper. "That correlation and proactive analytics allows us to drive behavior in ways that we didn't have."
To learn more:
- read the article from Worcester Business Journal