Electronic Health Records
December 6, 2007
Poll Results Reinforce Kaiser Permanente's Findings About Benefits of Electronic Medical Records
A majority of Americans believe electronic medical records can improve health care and that those benefits outweigh privacy risks, according to a Harris Interactive poll conducted for The Wall Street Journal.
Those findings support the results of a survey Kaiser Permanente conducted for its inaugural Health Care IT Summit May 2 in Washington, D.C. More than 100 health care advocates, providers, policymakers and purchasers gathered at that summit to discuss the benefits and challenges of widespread adoption of electronic health information technology.
The Harris Interactive/Wall Street Journal poll surveyed 2,153 American adults Nov. 12-14. Among the survey's findings:
- 74 percent believe that patients could receive better care if doctors and researchers were able to share information more easily via electronic medical systems
- 63 percent believe that the use of electronic medical records could significantly decrease the frequency of medical errors, and
- 60 percent believe that the benefits of electronic medical records outweigh the privacy risks.
The Kaiser Permanente survey conducted for the Health Care IT Summit recorded similar findings. In that survey, 73 percent of respondents agreed that the benefits of electronic medical records outweighed any potential risk to patient privacy or the security of patient information.
For more about the Harris Interactive/Wall Street Journal poll, read this page in The Wall Street Journal online.
Read more about the Kaiser Permanente survey.
Read more about KP HealthConnect™, the world's largest civilian electronic health record project.
