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Published in Technology for Doctors, this article highlights the strategy that has been adopted in Canada to focus on EHRs vs. EMRs in physicians practices. It is time to shift the focus to the end-user and encourage widespread adoption and use of EMRs.

The Canadian Medical Association’s recent Health Care Transformation in Canada report calls for a fundamental change in the way healthcare technology is developed. The CMA wants information technology development to shift from building an information superhighway for healthcare to practical applications of technology at the point-of-care. “The focus has been on building systems for electronic health records (EHR) instead of electronic medical records (EMR),” says Dr. Anne Doig (pictured), president of the CMA.

The two terms are often used interchangeably but they’re very different, she says. “EHR describes broadly accessible records of information about a patient that are accessible across medical practices and contain information that might be germane to any practitioner looking at the individual. An EMR is a longitudinal record of a patient that a doctor maintains over time, and is the equivalent of a chart.”

Read the full article in Technology for Doctors

What are your thoughts? Do you think that the EHR is where we should be focusing our attention and energy or should the national focus shift to end-user adoption and EMRs?

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Read More: http://blog.canadianemr.ca/canadianemr/2010/08/technology-for-doctors-tfdnews-0106.html