Nov 22, 2019

Electronic health records' lax oversight endangers patients

Caitlin Owens, author of Vitals

Plans to ensure patient safety as the nation transitioned to electronic health records have yet to come to fruition a decade later, Kaiser Health News reports with Fortune.

Between the lines: Manufacturers of electronic health records, providers, policy wonks and Congress have either blocked the effort or stalled it through fights over how to do it correctly.

  • For example, health data experts in 2009 wanted to create a national databank to track safety issues related to the new technology, but it never happened.
  • "[T]he parties have squabbled over how best to collect injury data, over who has the power to require it, over who should pay for it, and over whether to make public damning findings and the names of those responsible for safety problems," KHN and Fortune write.

Why it matters: Thousands of patient safety reports related to EHRs have accrued in the meantime.

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