The new age electronic patient record system

Abstract

Health care management costs rise yearly, especially in the areas of personnel and the expenses of generating and maintaining the patients' records. A substantial informational burden is incurred with each patient visit to a health professional, and patients' needs are often lost in the shuffle of medical records, insurance information, and red tape. However during the last few years significant progress has been made in the development of clinically useful medical decision support system to assist the health care provider. Earlier efforts to implement computer-based patient records mainly used keyboard entry, but with the latest technology, voice activated clinical reporting systems could be a central component of such a computer-based system in the future. Several groups are in the process of developing portable data management device. This will allow the clinicians to have on-line readily transferable patient records, decision making support and searching of remote databases to better analyze complex health care delivery problems. When the medical transcriptions are forwarded to an off-site location, this unique device will reduce the time and the cost of re-recording and transmission. This device will help the user to maintain and update the data remotely and instantly. It will also provide immediate information updates and database manipulations for all aspects of medical data management, provide portable multiple and simultaneous access to complete database information. These will significantly reduce paperwork and personnel costs.