ABSTRACT
The electronic health record (EHR) is digitally linked to pharmacies through a statewide e-prescribing system. Additionally, the health system has leveraged problem lists and procedure codes for clinical decision support alerts that guide an individual patient’s care. Outside records are either received by the EHR via direct data interfaces or entered as scanned documents. One local site administrator announces that due to the problems with the EHR, the site will not schedule any more patients that day because they are already two-thirds booked. Without the EHR, providers made mistakes, potentially harming patients. Health system productivity suffered, which not only affected the organization as a whole but also could have affected the staff since all employees receive productivity-based incentive compensation. As EHRs become “mission-critical” elements of patient care, downtime is an extremely disruptive process and significant issue for most patient care settings.
