Below, a guest post by Christopher Johnson, a physician who has practiced pediatric critical care for more than three decades. For many years, Johnson served as the Director of the Pediatric Critical Care Service at the Mayo Clinic and Professor of Pediatrics at Mayo Medical School. Today, he devotes his time to practicing pediatric critical care as President of Pediatric Intensive Care Associates, P.C., i n St. Cloud, Minnesota, and as Medical Director of the PICU for CentraCare Health Systems.
In addition, Johnson writes about medicine for general readers, both on his blog and in books such as HowYour Child Heals: An Inside Look at Common Childhood Ailments and How to Talk To Your Child’s Doctor: A Handbook for Parents
Not a few doctors complain that, too often, electronic medical records seem designed to improve billing, rather than to improve care. Johnson suggests that today’s EMRs are trying to serve too many masters—not just doctors, but payers and lawyers who want to see information laid out in easy-to-read “templates.”
With a single keystroke, one can “drag and drop” information from previous notes into these templates, Johnson observes. But when physicians use them to record their progress notes, something important is lost: the patient’s story. Traditionally, progress notes set out to “tell, from day to day, what physicians did to a patient and why,” Johnson explains. They are a narrative that fleshes out the patient’s history in a way that helps other doctors treating the same patient.
Johnson uses and appreciates the many ways that EMRS can help him. But when writing out his progress notes, he ignores those smart templates, and tells the story the old-fashioned way, typing out his progress notes, just the way he did when he used pen and paper. Not only does this help other doctors, but Johnson says, it gives him a chance to “think things through.”
Narrative connects the dots.
—MM
The Electronic Medical Record and the Disappearance of Patients’ Stories
By Chris Johnson, M.D.
The electronic medical record (EMR) is here to stay. Its adoption was initially slow, but over the past decade those hospitals that do not already have it are making plans for implementing it. On the whole this represents progress: the EMR has the ability to greatly improve patient care. Physicians, as well as all other caregivers, no longer have to puzzle over barely legible handwritten notes or flip through pages and pages of a patient’s paper chart to find important information.