Implementing an Electronic Medical Record into my Urology Practice

Implementing an Electronic Medical Record into my Urology Practice

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act calls for electronic medical records for all patients by 2014. Funding for implementation of EMR by the government has helped remove some of the barriers to purchasing the expensive new technology.With the government subsidies, itwas time forour practice, Northern Virginia Urology, to begin thelong and difficult process ofimplementing EMR into our practice. I will try to describe our experience.

Since I was the practicing manager and I was the most computer savvy of all of my partnersin Alexandria UrologicalAssoc which is adivision of Northern Virginia Urology(www.nvurology.com), I was nominated to beon the EMR Committee. Our first task was to evaluate all of the various EMR's that were available. Each EMR had it's strengths and weaknesses but most of us on the committee preferred Urochar EMR. Mostly because it was urologic specific and it was developed by a urologist. This was an important decision because I have heard about horror stories where practices purchased EMR's but abandoned it after a year or so to purchase another EMR. The thought of going through this twice was enough motivation to have us do our due diligence. We met several times with the vendor, talked to large urology practices that just implemented Urochart, andafter several months we decidedto purchase Urochart.

Now the fun really begins. We had to hire an IT firm to assist with the implentation processand management of our EMR after implemenation. The IT companies first responsibility was to evaluate our current hardware and make recommendations on the need for new hardware and upgrades. I was told that the computers inour office wasadequate but we needed equipment for two scanning stations, a server and a wireless router. I later discovered that our computers met the minimal requirements to run Urochart but we would need new computers and/or upgrades like more memory, new video card and a second monitor in order to run Urochart more efficiently.Changing ourphysiciansand staffs work flow with EMR was going to be difficult enoughand I didn't want a slow computer to add to our frustration. I have just placed an order for the new equipment and can't wait until it arrives.

In the mean time, more meetings. We have to make decisions on what information is scanned from our paper charts. How many years are we going to scan, where do these scans go within Urochart? What's the name of the button? We also need to decide as a group how the content is going to appear.

Despite the numerous hours already spent, I am very excited about the process. There will be growing pains but the advantages will be worth it. This is what keeps me going:

1. Nice having all of mypatients information at my fingertips. Now when a patient calls me after hours, I can view their information right from home. No more flipping through charts. No more asking my staff to pull a chart.

2. I can generate a referral letter as I see the patient. No more dictation service.

3. Electronic prescribing.

Just to name a few.

Jeffrey Wong, MD, FACS

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