Mandatory use of electronic health records: Overcoming physician resistance

Literature supports the idea that electronic health records hold tremendous value for the healthcare system in that it increases patient safety, improves the quality of care and provides greater efficiency. The move toward mandatory implementation of electronic health records is a growing concern in the United States health care industry. The government has placed enormous pressure to utilize health information technology such as electronic health records. This qualitative study was conducted in order to explore and describe how physicians overcame previous resistance towards electronic health records in hopes that this knowledge can help other physicians move towards adoption as the government mandate approaches for the implementation of the system by the end of 2014. A purposeful sample of 10 physicians who had implemented electronic health records and had previous resistance towards the system participated in the study. Data were collected via telephone interviews. Interview data was transcribed, coded and analyzed utilizing a thematic analysis. Findings revealed nine themes and depicted the following ways physicians can overcome resistance towards electronic health records: having a lot of patience, adequate training, support from other physicians, ease of documenting, and the fact that it will become mandatory and will affect reimbursement. The information discovered in this study provides ways physicians can overcome resistance, implement and utilize the system in order to improve patient safety, quality of care and greater efficiency for all Americans.