Globally Rational

So far, the American healthcare industry has been unnecessarily slow in joining the Information Age.  Although the excuse is usually the fact that they want to ensure safety and confidentiality of patient data, anybody who has ever worked in the industry knows that it’s far easier to misplace a paper file (thousands of which can be found in every doctor’s office) than it is to fall victim to an online hacker.  Honestly, you could call my doctor’s office right now and if you pretend to be me, they’ll give you any information you need.  I think the real reason why many medical practitioners haven’t digitized their records is because many of the administrative assistants in the industry don’t like anything to change (for instance, I once worked for a doctor who had to buy a more expensive and less effective piece of software just because it was the only program with which his assistant was familiar).

And this is why I’m not Libertarian… this is another example of a case where the government needs to intervene; in this case, the purpose is to make sure that our healthcare system doesn’t have pointless inefficiencies.  Luckily, Congress jumped in this time to create penalties for physicians who don’t start using electronic prescriptions.  I see a lot of advantages:

• This signals the end of the notorious “illegible doctor’s handwriting” issue.
• Patients often have serious complications from drug interactions, usually because their physician doesn’t know what other drugs they are taking.  E-prescriptions will allow doctors and pharmacists to have an automated system that throws up a red flag every time a patient is about to get a drug that could interact harmfully with one of their other drugs.
• That same automated system will also reduce allergic reactions to drugs.
• The process for prescriptions and refills will become much more efficient.  Right now, a patient can’t get a refill on a prescription until it the pharmacy gets approval from the patient’s physician, which typically takes hours or days.
• This will do wonders for quality control; it will be very easy to see if a doctor is favoring more profitable drugs (pharmaceutical companies often provide incentives for doctors to prescribe certain drugs) when the patient would be better off with a cheaper alternative.

And that’s just a few things that I can think of off the top of my head.  Feel free to post any other pros/cons in the comments… if they’re legitimate, I’ll add them to the list.

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