Clinical workflow that is just not sustainable

I am officially a huge fan of "futurist" Jeff Goldsmith (President of Health Futures). In my last post (I can't believe it was over a month ago), I quoted his thoughts about how "core measure mania" and the lack of innovation in HIT are resulting in a failure to address horrible EMR interfaces which make it harder for physicians to improve quality and efficiency.

In a recent interview in California Healthline, he elaborated further by explaining, "It isn't merely the tools that are the problem, but the fact that we have this micro accountability problem with the payment system and increasingly with the quality measurement process. We're absolutely inundating caregivers on the front lines with a level of detail that's required for them to document in their clinical workflow that is just not sustainable…. we're diverting a huge chunk of the clinical work force's available time to feeding the machine."

Bang - he nailed it right on the head.  Said another way, one of our fundamental problems is that we are using EMRs to force doctors to document for billing purposes - which takes a lot of time and energy.   And our EMR vendors keep giving us slightly refined versions of the same process, essentially saying "this upgrade will make it a little easier to do this really hard and unsatisfying task".   Instead, we need systems that focus on helping physicians (and other clinicians) actually take care of their patients, and make documentation the "byproduct" of that care.   I know, it sounds like common sense... but it just is not happening to any significant degree (don't worry - I, and hopefully others, are working on it).

Other great quotes from this interview:

I would have given meaningful users of clinical IT who actually followed the embedded care guidelines ... a malpractice shelter. That would have been the approach I would have taken is to carve out some kind of exception and reduce their malpractice expense.
Cool - I like this idea.  Instead of the government "piecemeal" giveaway of $40 billion dollars, why not use that force and energy to actually change the system... with the knowledge that short term incentives rarely provide long-term gains... it is much better to change the system at a large sense. 

I think at this point the meaningful changes are going to come from the margins not from the core vendors.
As with every industry with a lot of "big companies" who have trouble innovating due to their size, watch for the rise of smaller companies who will be creating products and services that will work both with and without the existing HIT infrastructure in place.  

Other interesting announcements of particular relevance:

* CMS launches their Innovation Center, with a goal to create better experiences of care and better health outcomes for all Americans and at lower costs through improvements.   It appears their method will be to "identify and test care models that provide beneficiaries with a seamless care experience, better health and lower costs” (per physician Richard Gilfillan, the acting director for the new center, in their news release).
* ONCHIT launches SMArt (Substitutable Medical Apps, reusable technologies) - an iPhone like platform which will allow developers to create apps using consistent standards.   And yes, this is VERY exciting stuff - something I've been talking and lecturing about for the past few years... can't wait to see how this unfolds!
* Video montage of HIT Usability Problems - from Canada's Healthcare Human Factors Group