April 10, 2019

Health care's panacea: Electronic Health Records

A local provider, Iowa Clinic, has just been handed a $12.25 million verdict due to an Electronic Health Records (EHR) screwup. The pathologist used a bar code scanner with too many records lying on her desk and the report showing prostate cancer was attributed to the wrong patient (resulting in a mistaken prostate removal for one patient and we don't know what for the other patient.) 4/5/2019 Des Moines Register story on malpractice verdict

On the same day, we learn that two Battle Creek, Michigan doctors have closed their practice because hackers wiped out their entire records system (patient charts, billings, test results, etc.) when they refused to pay the ransom. 4/5/2019 story on medical clinic hacking

That's a lot to take in.