Obama Reelection Doesn't Alter Complexity Of EHR Adoption

The reelection of President Barack Obama won’t change the intricate realities underway in the trenches as physicians and practices perform the difficult task of replacing paper with electronic health records (EHRs).

While the election outcome means that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) will move forward, health IT adoption, on which health reform depends, has thus far continued apace, no matter who was going to become president.

The deployment of EHRs and their meaningful use are progressing, driven faster by the potential for federal incentives to help offset provider investment, but the process toward digitizing health care, like other industries before it, faces the strains and disruptions of maturing technologies.