EHR In Health Care

520 Words3 Pages

Most people don’t think to worry or wonder where all of their information goes when they visit the doctor’s office, or how the doctor knew things about them from several years ago. They don’t ask the question especially when they go to a new doctor who knows the same thing about them that they’ve never talked about. Electronic Health Records, also known as EHR’s, are becoming some of the most important parts of medical offices around the country and are advancing more and more each day. Ever since the 80’s, EHR’s were being designed and formed, but not until 2009, when the HITECH Act came out, did they start becoming of key importance to the health care market. As they keep growing more and more each day, EHR’s are becoming vital to patient health. …show more content…

Starting in 2009, in the result of the HITECH Act, institutions were rewarded financially for implementing these electronic health record systems into their practices, with more than $35 billion invested. According toWithin a few years, the rates of Medicare or Medicaid EHR adoption increased dramatically for physicians and hospitals. From 2010 to 2012, hospital EHR implementation rates grew to 44%, while physician EHR implementation rose from 20% to 40%, and those rates should keep rising (Cite One). The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act is mainly looked at for reduction in health disparities. One tactic being used to fight these health disparities is researching demographic data and applying this data to electronic health records. Using tactics like this should be able to help increase the demand for EHR programs and decrease health