Which Medicals Fields Are Embracing EHRs?

Although the federal government is calling for physicians across all medical fields to make the change from paper files to electronic health records (EHR), there's a significant difference in which specialties are adapting to this change and which are falling behind.

The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act, which was enacted as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, calls for physicians to transition to electronic health records technology. This shift has been gradually put into effect over recent years.

Practices that replace their paper filing system with an EHR or electronic medical records (EMR) within the allotted tiered timeframe receive financial incentives, while those that do not make the switch by the set schedule will receive penalties for every year that they do not adapt to the new technology.

So which practices are readily adapting to EHRs?

Primary care and internal medicine are taking the lead, according to the Software Advice EHR Software UserView survey, conducted in collaboration with leading digital data collection company Research Now.

The survey researchers noted that the large variety of responders within the medical field means that 41 percent of the sample belong to a specialty not listed in the top ten, and therefore had to select the Other category.

The survey did, however, show that most of the self-reported EHR users were with a small practice (48%), while EHR users from large practices and medium practices were almost tied, coming in at 27% and 26%, respectively.

The Dr. Leonardo webuilder creates beautiful and easy-to-navigate healthcare websites for various specialties within the healthcare, dental, veterinary and alternative medicine fields. Every site made using Dr. Leonardo has the option to add an EHR or EMR Patient Portal that provides a gateway for access to patient records.

Want to find out if Dr. Leonardo has a design for your unique specialty? Click here to view the full list!

Dr. Leonardo Lets You Build an Effective Websites for Your Healthcare Practice!

Create your own high quality, professional site in four incredibly easy steps using Dr. Leonardo, a convenient Internet Presence Management tool that also allows users to fill their practice's site with informative patient education and award-winning images. Click here to get started!