Survey: Doctors mixed on electronic medical records

• Some doctors say electronic record keeping distracts from patient care
• Congress created the Meaningful Use program in 2009 when it passed the federal stimulus bill
• Proponents say electronic records improve patient care and will lower costs

Correction: Doctors and hospitals will see decreases in their Medicare reimbursements if they haven't joined the Meaningful Use program by 2015. An earlier version of this story misstated the type of reimbursements that would be reduced.

A study by the Rand Corp., a non-profit worldwide research group, found that electronic health records, or EHRs, are a mixed bag for doctors. Though doctors in the survey said they believe that EHRs are improving some aspects of quality care for patients, the conversion has increased workloads, been more costly than originally thought and has limited face time with patients.

The study, conducted last summer and released in the fall, was sponsored by the American Medical Association, which has lobbied the federal government for more flexibility with EHR mandates.

"It just takes a lot more time and is much more cumbersome," said Steven Stack, an emergency physician in Lexington, Ky., and a member of the AMA's Board of Trustees. Doctors, he added, are not trying to halt the transition from paper to electronic, but they do want to make that transition less painful by being more reasonable with what Stack said is a "one size fits all" program.

"It's not that doctors are dinosaurs and don't see the value of the technology," he said.

Congress created the Meaningful Use program in 2009 when it passed the federal stimulus bill. Although the program is voluntary, doctors and hospitals will see decreases in their Medicare reimbursements if they haven't joined the program by 2015. The third phase of Meaningful Use was supposed to have started in 2016, but earlier this month the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services extended the start date to 2017 to address industry concerns.

Proponents say EHRs will improve patient care, lower costs over time and allow patients to be more involved with their health.

Dr. Sam Butler, who works for Epic Systems, a health care software developer in Verona, Wis., said the most common users of EHRs are patients, who can do things like check lab results or order prescription refills over their phones.

"Because we're doing this, it's going to make life a lot better for everybody," Butler said.

But some doctors complain they spend more time looking at computer screens than patients, and they say that EHRs can't always communicate with each other, making the seamless sharing of information an elusive goal.

"The technology was not mature enough to be deployed in this broad based way," Stack said.

Ellis and Walker also report for the Argus Leader, Sioux Falls, S.D.