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HOME > ABOUT > PRESS > WEST COUNTY HEALTH CENTERS SWITCH TO EMR
Article published - June 20, 2008
Credit: PRESS DEMOCRAT
West County Health Centers switch to electronic medical records
By Martin Espinoza
Medical assistant Sean Lyons enters patient information for infant Jose Alexander Ortega, as he and his mother, Emely Calderon, wait for a doctor to perform a checkup this week at the Russian River Health Center in Guerneville.
Only 18 days old, Jose Alexander Ortega is among a new generation of Americans whose entire health history may one day be stored on memory chips, with key information periodically updated wirelessly through the Internet.
Jose's postnatal checkup helped launch electronic health records at Guerneville's Russian River Health Center, the county's first community clinic to begin the move away from paper records. Here, 25,000 manila folders eventually will give way to a computer server and a handful of electronic tablets with Bluetooth and Wi-Fi capability.
The absence of a manila folder was the first thing Jose's mother noted.
"I've never seen anyone use that kind of system, but it seems obvious that it would be much more efficient," said Emely Judith Calderon of Guerne-ville, speaking in Spanish.
Efficiency is only one of the benefits electronic health records promise to deliver. Just as technology has transformed business in recent years, many champions of electronic medical records believe they are a tool to transform health care from a system of treatment to one of prevention.
The trend has picked up speed in Sonoma County beyond Kaiser Permanente's ongoing rollout of its vast electronic health records program.
In Santa Rosa, the Mendocino Avenue Care Center, a family practice medical office with more than 50,000 patient records, also went "live" this week with electronic records.
On July 29, the oncology department at Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital will be the first unit to implement St. Joseph Health System's fully integrated electronic medical records system.
Heather Willems, clinical architect for Memorial's project, said the move toward electronic health records is a tedious process that is far more advanced on the East Coast. Only now, after years of planning, are records systems being launched here, she said.
Certain aspects of health care, such as scheduling appointments and billing, have been computerized for years.
An electronic health record is different because it creates a portal to a patient's health profile and past history that can be accessed by doctors, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, lab technicians and the patients themselves.
When fully implemented, orders for drug prescriptions will go directly from the doctor to the pharmacy. Before a pill is swallowed, dangerous interactions between drugs will quickly be identified. Patients will have the ability to view lab test results, make online appointment requests or cancellations and exchange e-mail with their doctors.
Modern computing power also could give primary care clinics like the West County Health Centers, which operates the Russian River Health Center, an edge it never had before: the ability to quickly mine or process data to determine critical health care trends for its patients.
"In the current system, I don't have an easy way to tell you how well I am delivering care," said Dr. Steve Bromer, medical director of West County Health Centers.
The centers' launch of electronic health records is the starting point of a $12 million project that in the next three years will bring electronic records to Redwood Community Health Coalition's 18 health care sites in Sonoma, Marin, Napa and Yolo counties.
Dr. Jason Cunningham, medical director of the West County Health Centers' new Sebastopol clinic, spent Wednesday at the Guerneville clinic helping nurses and doctors adjust to the new system.
Because the new system facilitates communication between medical professionals and their patients, he said clinic staff can be "proactive, not reactive," calling patients before acute conditions arise to help them better manage their care.
Bromer said he anticipated some problems and as a result, fewer patients will be seen during the first weeks of the transition.
Likewise, the five family doctors at the Mendocino Avenue Care Center have scaled back their patient intake by 50 percent during the first two weeks.
"The learning process and learning curve to implement the system is huge," said Steve Wolf, a family practitioner at the Mendocino Avenue practice. "That's why you have to slow it down."
Wolf's practice is the first medical office of Sutter Medical Group of the Redwoods to receive electronic records. The project is part of Sutter Health's transition toward electronic records via the physician groups that partner with Sutter's medical foundations.
Sutter Health's first hospital won't get electronic health records until early 2009. Sutter is using a system based on the same software used by Kaiser Permanente's HealthConnect, which was launched at its Santa Rosa medical offices and hospital last June.
It's a slow start to a high-tech movement that many predicted would spread like wildfire.
The high cost of the technology, a fragmented health care system and a way of practicing medicine that dates to the early part of the last century has prevented the vast majority of U.S. doctors and hospitals from making the switch.
"We don't really have a health care system," said Bromer, the West County Health Centers medical director. "We're building a model for efficient, safe, timely, patient-centered care so that when we have a national health system, we can be part of that solution."
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