Research scientist in Indianapolis have discovered that using a pen and paper in conjunction with an electronic medical record prove useful says an article in HealthcareITNews.com.
It seems that being 100% electronic may not be as efficient as originally thought. In fact, the number one reason for using a paper and pen as a workaround was efficiency and ease of use. Another common reason was as a memory aid.
Something that caught my eye was the third most common reason for using a paper and pen as a workaround: alerts. With all of the icons and things to click on a screen, how easy is it to miss an alert? If the alerts are 'soft stops' and can be clicked through without taking an action, then what is to prevent someone from becoming click happy and missing an important alert?
In this era of transition to fully computerized health records, maybe having a pen and paper handy isn't so bad after all.
Jonathan S. Ware, MD
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Great point. A medical sociologist named Marc Berg has written extensively about some of the positive aspects of paper. Paper records can store a lot of information based on differnet colors of ink, or the addition of sticky notes. Not the best for retrival and storage, but the point is that paper is functional.
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