Two Ohio health systems have implemented electronic health records to reduce medical mistakes, improve patient care and avoid duplicative tests, the Toledo Blade reports. However, these two systems face the challenge of trying to made the systems interoperable.
Mercy Health Partners has already established an EHR system at one of their hospitals and plans to spend $13.5 million by the end of 2006 to install the system at its other hospitals. The system includes functions such as alerts for physicians and nurses when medications are wrongly prescribed, online lab results and access to patient treatment guidelines. Eventually, the system will allow physicians to record their notes in the electronic files.
However, the program cannot exchange information with nearby rival hospitals, the Blade reports. Also, while the system provides physicians with some access to inpatient EHRs from their offices, the records are not linked to outpatient medical information either because the data is on paper or because of the lack of interoperability of a private physician's office computer system.
Promedica Health Systems which owns other hospitals in the Toledo area -- also has invested millions of dollars over the last 10 years developing an EHR system. The Blade reported that one of ProMedica’s information staffers was of the opinion that that while standards are needed, it is more important to create a number for each patient, or a national patient identifier so that there could be a universal medical record to make it simpler to keep track of patients – however, universal patient numbers currently are prohibited under federal law due to privacy concerns.