New numbers have recently come out, highlighting how low the adoption rate is for electronic medical records in hospitals.

As reported by MedPage Today, the study from the NEJM found that only 1.5 percent of hospitals surveyed had comprehensive electronic medical record systems. That’s a piss-poor adoption rate, and far lower than the dismal numbers in small office practices.

The reasons cited are no surprise to regular readers (more…)

Which events of 2008 most affected and will continue to affect practicing physicians?

Here are my top 3.

First, is Medicare’s institution of “never” events, where payment is denied for certain medical errors. In addition to uncontroversial events like operating on the wrong patient, Medicare has also included conditions where total prevention is impossible, including patient falls and hospital acquired infections. By doing (more…)

Microsoft released a study looking at the patterns of those who perform health-related searches on popular search engines.

To no one’s surprise, “self-diagnosis by search engine frequently leads Web searchers to conclude the worst about what ails them.”

People only looked at the first few results for their keyword symptom searches, which often contained zebras like “ALS” or “brain tumor,” meaning they often (more…)