Some EHR platforms allow patients to coproduce medical notes with clinicians, which could positively impact patient engagement, but such collaborations could also increase clinician workload and overwhelm patients, according to Medscape.
After reviewing interviews with 29 industry experts, including primary care physicians, patient advocates and health IT professionals, John Mafi, MD, and a team of colleagues from the David Geffen School of Medicine at UC Los Angeles identified key trends in perceptions about OurNotes, a variation of the OpenNotes platform.
Only two of the interviewees had personal experiences with informal versions of OurNotes, an EHR software that allows patients to view and add to their visit notes in their healthcare provider's EHR, but most were familiar with OpenNotes, a national movement dedicated to encouraging clinicians to share medical notes with their patients.
Here are five potential impacts of coproducing visit notes.
1. Improved patient engagement. An OurNotes tool may promote patient centric-care, and many "participants generally anticipated that patients and families would benefit considerably from contributing to medical notes," the authors wrote.
2. Improved communication and alignment of patient and clinician goals. Most providers indicate they would use the tool to ask patients to review previous visit notes before upcoming appointments, write a semistructured interval histories and describe goals for the visit, however, "many participants viewed interventions during and between visits as unrealistic," Dr. Mafi and his colleagues said.
3. Impact on clinician workflow. Nearly all clinicians believed OurNotes would add burden to their workflows.
4. Additional burden to patients. Clinicians believed patients would be cautious to welcome the idea. "OurNotes could impose unaccustomed and unwelcome accountabilities on some patients," according to the authors. "Not all patients will want to contribute directly to their records, and those urged to do so may feel intimidated."
5. How the tool might work. Clinicians recommended using the tool as a way for patients to upload photographs, look for inaccuracies in their medical data or introduce patient decision aids.
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