ZDoggMD, the Stanford hospitalist-turned-rapper, has taken up arms in the great EHR debate in his new video, "EHR State of Mind," a parody of Jay Z and Alicia Keys' "Empire State of Mind."
Released in conjunction with the announcement of athenahealth's "Let Doctors Be Doctors" campaign, the song's lyrics span the broad spectrum of common physician complaints with EHRs, interoperability, vendors and the state of health IT overall.
"I have a love-hate relationship with the EHR," ZDoggMD wrote in a blog post accompanying the video. "To be precise, it's 90 percent hate, 6 percent love. The missing 4 percent? That would be the percentage of time spent on the phone with tech support trying to figure out which order set I have to use to input percentages."
The "Let Doctors Be Doctors" campaign was created to help physicians voice their struggles and complaints with the technology that many feel detracts from patient care.
"It's time to talk about the elephant in the exam room: Electronic health records are failing healthcare. At athenahealth, we're not afraid to admit it," Jonathan Bush, CEO and co-founder of athenahealth wrote in a LinkedIn post Monday. "Today, I'm proud to announce LetDoctorsBeDoctors.com, a forum for healthcare professionals to contribute their vision for the future of EHRs."
athenahealth and ZDoggMD are encouraging physicians to offer their feedback and EHR recommendations, which will be presented in Washington, D.C., at a later date to help develop policy initiatives to improve EHR usability and interoperability.