Four spine surgeons discuss the impact of electronic health records and whether they have seen a return on investment.
Ask Spine Surgeons is a weekly series of questions posed to spine surgeons around the country about clinical, business and policy issues affecting spine care. We invite all spine surgeon and specialist responses. Next week's question: Where do you see your biggest patient volume growth coming from in the future?
Please send responses to Anuja Vaidya at avaidya@beckershealthcare.com by Wednesday, May 21, at 5 p.m. CST.
Question: In your opinion, have electronic health records been worth the investment so far?
Rey Bosita, MD, Spine Surgeon, Texas Back Institute, Plano: Like training for a marathon, the first few months of training are very painful, but then as all the members of the organization learn how to use it and the workflows change accordingly, electronic medical records get easier. Everything in the office — from scheduling to medical records to data storage to billing — will change when the EMR is adopted. Be ready for resistance, especially from less tech-savvy doctors and staff members.
There are still difficulties in communicating between the different EMR systems, but overall I am optimistic that the electronic transformation of medicine will make things better in the future.
The costs, thus far, in both the hospital and outpatient setting have been astronomical, and this is especially troubling in these uncertain times with reimbursement declining and expenses rising.
Although there has been some reimbursement from the government, it is not enough yet to offset the increased costs in hardware, software, training and manpower.
Brian R. Gantwerker, MD, Neurosurgeon, The Craniospinal Center of Los Angeles: Not really. But, it provides a level of connectivity that makes recalling patient information easily. However, we become completely dependent on that connectivity and our crippled during a WiFi or hardware outage.
Richard A. Kube II, MD, CEO, Founder, Prairie Spine & Pain Institute, Peoria, Ill.: There have been pluses and minuses. Information is available and legible on a more frequent basis. There is also greater access to information when one is away from the office.
Unfortunately, most EMR systems have been primarily burdened with compliance issues for the past several years, which means that user interface has taken a back seat. Given that, I do not believe that the extremely high cost to implement an electronic system has been matched with enough increase in efficiency and production to add up to value for the average practice.
I think that for most, this has been an added cost to do business without providing any real ability to offset cost with any significant increase in revenue or cost containment.
Sheeraz Qureshi, MD, Chief, Spinal Trauma, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York City: While there are several advantages to electronic medical records, the perfect EMR still doesn't exist. The key positives of EMRs are ease of access, ease of inter-provider communication and the ability to collect outcomes data in a simple manner. The challenge of an EMR is implementation in a busy practice without creating a "slow down" effect.
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