Hey everyone,
Last week we:
This week we:
EPICparodyEMR @EPICEMRparody
September 20th 2020
49 Retweets310 Likes
While this tweet is tongue-in-cheek. It does give an excellent idea of how hard EHRs and, specifically, EPIC are to use. EPIC is notoriously difficult to use and unfortunately, they aren’t the only ones.
The thing that boggles my mind is, why, if so many people create memes, parody twitter accounts, and run study and after study, are EHRs still so difficult to use. My guess is that massive UX and UI improvements just aren’t seen as a cost effective way of helping hospitals and practices get paid more. Additionally, many recent articles are touting the importance of using NLU, AI, and the like in EHRs. However, very few articles tout the importance of typographic hierarchy, accessibility, lower cognitive load, smart system architecture, and flexible design systems.
KLAS found in a recent study that about a third of nurses reporting burnout say it is because of their EHR. Thankfully, overall only about 25% of nurses report being burned out. However, I wouldn’t be surprised if several other burnout causes are at least indirectly due to or made worse by the EHR. Specifically when it comes to bureaucratic tasks. I would wager that “Too much time spent on bureaucratic tasks” can be at least lessened by the EHR when it comes to documentation or communication tasks. This is a good reminder that the issues of the EHR don’t only apply to doctors.
Becker’s Health IT recently asked seven hospital executives what they would do if they could wave a magic wand over their EHR. Dr. Daniel Durand, of Life Bridge Health, had the most interesting point:
The magic wand question has long been used by user researchers and designers. It’s an excellent question to ask as it gives your participant an opportunity to dream about what they want. I’ve asked this question several times and have gotten excellent responses.
Dr. Durand’s answer confirms a lot of what we have been working on. The difference between inputting structured and unstructured data creates too many pain points for clinician users.
Our solution aims to use these technologies to help clinicians document and extract relevant data quickly and easily with a low cognitive load. The end result is that they are able to spend more meaningful time with patients and not have to babysit their computers.