Healthcare providers are currently transforming the way information is handled, with major efforts being initiated to implement the infrastructure and applications needed to provide a fully interconnected, complete electronic health record (EHR). In conjunction with efforts to adopt EHRs, hospitals are actively seeking to convert their paper based work environments into paperless work environments and transform their health information management (HIM) resources.
The reasons for this conversion are many, including more centralized patient records management, the move toward computerized physician order entry (CPOE), and the need for timely access to medical history, improved data privacy and security, regulatory compliance, and, more generally, improved operational effectiveness and reduced costs. Hospitals need to leverage transformational approaches for supporting the adoption of EHR and achieving the benefits of a strategy for records transition alongside their EHR implementation.
Key strategies include using records transition to provide an on-ramp to EHR by digitizing existing records to provide a single view of the patient’s medical history in an efficient manner at the point of care, accelerating physician adoption by minimizing the need for providers to use hybrid paper and electronic records systems to deliver care during the transition period Leveraging the transition to increase security and ensure patient privacy and compliance with HIPAA regulations, improving records management overall while moving to a more accessible electronic format Implementing approaches that deliver near term value today while creating a sustainable records management and archiving approach for the long term.