Microfilm Faces Obsolescence as Paper Medical Records Hit the Dust Bin

 

 

For years hospitals and doctor’s offices placed medical records in neat folders held in filing cabinets. After discharge from a hospital, the patient could easily access his records and copy them for a year. Then they went into a storage facility or transferred onto microfilm. When a patient needed copies, the medical records librarian would pull the microfilm, read through it on a microfilm enlarger, them print copies that were gray and indistinct. Electronic Medical Records, EMR, reduced the need for paper records and microfilm retrieval. According to www.datawitness.com, a microfilm can be translated into digital data storage which enables the data to be retrieved electronically.

 

The Canadian Company, Datawitness, produced a web based system permitting data to be stored and recorded digitally. There is complete analogue back up of data, yet there is no need to store the microfilm. In a fascinating project, Datawitness worked on the e-time capsule project, in which data was stored in a time capsule to be buried at Stonehenge for 100 years, according to www.e-timecapsule.com. Hospitals and clinics felt buried by the volumes of paper records stored in their facilities. They embraced electronic records.

 

The West Virginia eHealth Initiative, www.wvehi.com, is a coalition of healthcare workers, business, and government to promote and coordinate the use of electronic medical records. WVeHI hopes to develop statewide health information exchange networks to connect physicians, laboratories, pharmacies, and hospitals. Patients will be able to readily retrieve their medical records. With the ability to collect and analyze data, healthcare will be improved and information shared easily. There will be fewer billing errors since the diagnoses will be in the electronic data.

 

To help train healthcare providers, The West Virginia Medical Foundation has helped stamp out microfilm and improve patient care with a Health Information Technology program. EMR permits information sharing at multiple locations. The information is at www.wvsma.com/foundation. Say “good bye” to micro film and “hello” to electronic medical records.