Google and Microsoft Look to Change Health Care - New York Times

Google and Microsoft Look to Change Health Care - New York Times

I'm encouraged that these two giants are actively engaged in leading the transition to online health records because massive inertia exists within the medical establishment to move to online health records. This inertia is not so much willful as it is snarled in the regulatory and privacy webs that keep such an enormous project from moving ahead more rapidly.

Approaching the problem from the patient/consumer perspective is the right direction as long as we end up with systems that are fully interoperable. The last thing we want is several incompatible and competing systems. Standards for electronic medical records are key to this and much work is underway in this arena. The question is how long the process will take. The Wikipedia reference above suggests to me that we are many years from implementation of a universal EMR.

Consumer 'pull' may yet overcome industry/establishment 'push' if the patient options are easy to use. I hope the debate can ratchet up soon so this show can get on the road. I find it archaic that I cannot communicate with my primary care physician via email. I don't expect that he would personally handle all my email, but office staff could assist with simple questions, prescription refills, etc.