Certainly, sweeping changes to an office's established policies and procedures often requires an investment of time, effort, and money. However, physicians focused on these drawbacks all too often fail to see the positives that come with the transition to an EMR-based practice: procedural, financial, and data-security benefits.

The most obvious difference between electronic medical records and paper records lies in portability and accessibility. Workers in a fully-functional EMR office don't have to hunt and file paperwork, since all patient records are stored digitally and can be quickly retrieved by a doctor in the exam room or an employee at the billing desk. The portability component of electronic medical records means that doctors can access records at home for after-hours calls through a secure interface, and many offices are making patient records available online to the patients themselves.

Financially, there's an obvious benefit to the EMR switch: while a piece of paper can hold a very limited amount of data, the storage capacity offered by modern computers is virtually limitless, leading to savings on office supplies, storage space, and archiving patient records. Not only that, but many medical records software packages offer fully integrated, highly efficient billing and claims systems, reducing the number of employees needed to maintain cash flow and increasing the amount of cash that's actually flowing.

The current concern, both on Capitol Hill and among presidential candidates, is data security. The push to become an EMR nation originated in the 1996 HIPAA legislation, which introduced massive changes to patient privacy rights. Last year saw the first prosecution of EMR theft, as well as the first unannounced HIPAA audit of a facility's electronic medical records procedures. Any EMR software company worth the investment should be able to explain clearly how their product is HIPAA-compliant; a truly reputable company will have their software audited by an independent third party (or two).