A new study suggests that while it's all well and good to track physician EMR adoption, it's not a great idea to lump all EMR systems together. The study, which was published in the American Journal of Medical Quality, looked at the type of system physicians adopted as well as when they adopted it. They concluded that many late adopters were failing to implement key EMR features, including patient safety and cost-control functions. In other words, all EMR adopters aren't equal.

In the study, which looked at 4,203 Florida physicians, researchers compared practices which adopted systems 10 or more years ago with a) those who installed three to nine years ago and b) those who adopted within the last two years. The first two groups were much more likely to have adopted e-prescribing, electronic pharmacy access and enhanced administrative functions.

Given this variety in adoption--and probable differences in technology attitudes that underly the differences--policy-makers should be study at the mindset of these different groups rather than simply looking at EMR adoption generally, researchers said.

To find out more about the study:
- read this iHealthBeat piece

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