The original point in the posting, which is one of the hottest Hubris
articles yet, but not anywhere near its topic, was simply this
choosing to hold medical records closer to the individual doctor is
better than choosing to hold them more centrally, or in larger
aggregates.
I don't think I missed any remark by our esteemed colleague and
representative on the GMSC, regarding whether he preferred records to
be more centralised or less centralised than they are, but I did get
the clear impression that none of them should be on computer. No
prescription printing, no dispensing labels, no allergy records, no
summaries, no nothing?
Given that approach, of course any money spent on commercial medical
records IT would be misapplied in that practice.
My view as a single-hander is that one can run a good small practice
organisation provided one has good handwriting and iron will, on paper
records,
and that one can do the same with all-electronic notes, with rather
less iron in the will, but that anything in between doesn't work early
as well.
However the more interesting uses of computers by doctors, such as
communications, including neater letters than most secretaries produce
with most typewriters*, access to references that otherwise would not
be easily available, and desktop publishing or customising advice
leaflets are applicable to all sizes of practices.
And when I was practicing in Riyadh I was being shot at, but not with
anything less than a metre across. The nearest one landed about 500m
away.
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* The IBM Selectric with its burn on carbon lettering was neater than
most modern lasers, but noisy and slow.
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