Digital Pens Let Old-school Doctors Utilize Electronic Medical Records

Most physicians who have been in practice for more than a few years are fairly set in their ways

. Typically, the physician interviews and examines a patient, and writes clinical notes on a clipboard. Later, the physician dictates the information into a recording device, and sends it off for transcription. The typed notes end up in the patient's chart, and the process goes on. Insurance claim forms and other medical forms are filled out by hand and processed by the office staff. This style of medical care and record-keeping has been standard for decades, but is quickly being superseded by the use of electronic medical records (EMR) systems, which do away with pen and paper in favor of computers and touch-screen devices.

Believers in EMR, including the federal government, claim that the use of electronic records can improve the efficiency of medical care, as well as the accuracy and currentness of the health information at hand. Computerized records systems also promise to prevent errors in medical care by performing automatic checks and alerts for prescription conflicts, allergies, and other important medical data. Some EMR systems can also handle billing, insurance claim forms, and even medical supply inventory.

Despite these potential benefits, he majority of doctors in the U.S. have not yet switched to electronic records. One of the main obstacles is the high price of implementation, though the 2009 economic stimulus allocated over $20 billion to help Medicare and Medicaid providers make the switch. Perhaps the most significant reason that physicians remain reluctant to adopt EMR is that the systems require a change in the doctors' long-established style of care. Dr. Alexander Stemer, president and CEO of Medical Specialists Centers of Indiana, says that the top priority of his practice is "to preserve the quality of physician-patient relationships by not subbing face time with screen time." But that doesn't mean Stemer and his partners are avoiding electronic records; rather, they simply found a way to balance their needs with the need to meet EMR guidelines from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, as well as meaningful use requirements to make the data quantifiable.

The solution is deceptively simple. All 13 Northwest Indiana locations of the Medical Specialists Centers of Indiana practice have adopted an EMR system that allows doctors to use digital pens as a bridge between the clipboard and the computer. The technology, developed by a Swedish company called Anoto, uses a tiny camera inside a pen that captures what is written on special paper designed with a special dot grid pattern. The written content is "printed" to a computer file that shows a picture of what was written, and can even be converted to typed text that is then pushed to the patient's digital chart. Though some view the digital pen as an unnecessary layer of the EMR experience, many doctors feel that the devices are necessary to seamlessly integrate new-school record keeping with good old one-on-one care.

by:John V

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