Nurses: Tell Us About Electronic Medical Records -- The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

July 09, 2013

What Do You Think About Electronic Charting?

Electronic medical records (EMRs), often referred to as "computerized charting," have made deep inroads into hospitals, outpatient settings, long-term care, home healthcare, and many other nursing workplaces. Or if they aren't there yet, they soon will be. Some nurses have been using EMRs for years; others are just facing the steep learning curve that is inevitable during the implementation of EMRs.

Following the publication of a recent Medscape Nurses "Ask the Expert" column, "Staying Late to Chart: Is This Legal?" nearly 400 nurses commented or sent emails to the editor, asking for further clarification or telling their tales of woe about EMRs. We hear you, and plan to explore this topic in greater detail. We want to get a better handle on the issues and problems faced by nurses following the implementation of EMRs in a wide range of healthcare settings.

We need your help. With your opinions and experiences, we hope to better define the problems that nurses are facing in the new world of EMRs, so that we can ask experts for solutions and develop future articles. Please take a few minutes to go through the survey embedded in this article. You will be able to see how your colleagues have responded right away. Note: We use the term "EMRs" throughout to refer to systems of electronic or computerized documentation or electronic health records (EHRs), which require nurses to do their documentation on computers rather than on paper.

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