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“since it means that their personal notes about their patients will be made available directly to the patient, something that was not possible in the past. Doct
by hanklazard 4y ago
“since it means that their personal notes about their patients will be made available directly to the patient, something that was not possible in the past. Doctors often write down their real thoughts about the patient in there and can say some things the patient might not be happy with.”
Just when you thought American healthcare couldn’t get worse, our genius leaders have decided to couple full and immediate patient access to medical notes with frequent patient surveys about their doctor’s visits. Did a patient request unnecessary antibiotics and you refused? Ouch, that’s going to hurt your survey results and possibly impact your future earnings. Oh also, they read through your visit note and saw that you added “obesity” to their problem list since their BMI puts them in that category and you wanted to make sure they were screened appropriately for diabetes and heart disease at their next visit. The patient finds this very offensive and has requested to meet with the practice manager about the situation.
- sethammons 4y ago"Patient feels nausea when seeing the color yellow; I have proscribed a placebo to gauge the effect." Not something a doc would want the patient to know.
- parineum 4y agoDoctors shouldn't be performing experiments.
- YLYvYkHeB2NRNT 4y agoRespectively they should. This is how they narrow down and diagnose something the right way. Something that your computer algorthims can not do,
- ceejayoz 4y agoKid has asthma? Experiment with an inhaler. Switch to a different one if it's not effective. Recurrent skin infection? Experiment with antibiotics to find one it's not resistant to. Patient on a ventilator? Getting them off will require experimenting with vent settings and periods of having them off the vent.
- parineum 4y agoTrying a medication that's proven effective to treat symptoms in some cases isn't the same as giving a placebo. One is regular medical practice and the other is medical research. People don't go to the doctor to participate in research, they go to get treated.
- mikeodds 4y agoThe flip side of this is it will let patients catch erroneous note taking which would have a knock on effect for future visits or referrals.
- rrwo 4y agoYes. I've had this once when moving to a new city and arranging to have my medical records transferred. My new doctor read the snarky and incorrect internal notes to me.
- hanklazard 4y agoI would say that “snarky” comments should not be a part of any medical note, so that’s unprofessional. Again though, these notes are not designed for patient consumption. As a physician myself, I have ZERO interest in reading my own doctor’s notes about my health—and I would prefer a system where my doctor doesn’t feel like he’s writing a document which I will be reading immediately. I want him to consider all the possibilities, even things that might be uncomfortable to me. I want him to get as close to truth discovery as possible and I don’t want to get in the way. If I don’t trust him to do so, I should find another doctor. The system as it was previously was better. I could request a full copy of my medical records whenever I wanted, but without making my doc feel like I could be constantly snooping on his notes. I know all of this “patient empowerment” seems like a good thing, but there may be some serious downsides of this implementation. What I would really like is an encrypted file that I can carry on me with an open format of all relevant medical records / labs / imaging that could be decrypted by any hospital or clinic EMR. That way, even if I’m unconscious or have forgotten my password, medical care can be given efficiently.