Why most EMR rollouts fail on usability, and what a fast consultation screen looks like.
The reason EMR rollouts fail is almost never that clinicians object to electronic records. It is that the software makes a five-minute consultation take twelve.
Count the clicks
If recording a routine consultation requires navigating four tabs and filling fields that exist for billing rather than care, doctors will keep paper notes and enter data afterwards, badly. The design target is that a common consultation can be recorded on one screen without scrolling.
Optimise for the common case
Most consultations in any department follow a small number of patterns. Templates for those, with sensible defaults and quick selection of frequent diagnoses and prescriptions, handle the majority of visits. The unusual case can take longer; it is rare.
Show history before asking for input
The first thing a clinician needs is what happened last time, current medication and recent results, visible immediately without searching. A system that demands data entry before it gives anything back is one people resent.
Involve two or three practising clinicians in the configuration and watch them use it under real time pressure before rollout. Their objections during that session are the requirements list.
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