Federal incentives for the meaningful use of EHRs has been a hot topic within the discipline and profession of chiropractic. A fairly recent article in Chiropractic Economics brought up some interesting issues.

There are definite champions of health IT who look at meaningful use of EHRs as a way to legitimize the profession in the eyes of the traditional medical establishment. One doctor of chiropractic noted that while those in the profession know chiropractic works, the profession "struggle(s) with a methodology to demonstrate outcomes."

So in his eyes, being able to demonstrate improved outcomes will help the profession not only gain more market share but also respect among other physician professions.

Mass adoption of EHRs is also being seen as a way to "help establish chiropractic as a modern profession" and will demonstrate doctors of chiropractic a "willingness to collaborate with the healthcare community for improved patient care." Furthermore, participation by doctors of chiropractics in statewide health information exchanges will help create a more complete picture of their patients' health records.

Interestingly, one interviewee pointed out that meaningful use of EHRs may be unattainable for some DCs because many of the core items and additional required items "fall outside the scope of practice for a chiropractor." If this is true, this may be a deal breaker for those DCs. Is purchasing a potentially expensive EHR system that will not be fully optimized worth the trouble?

All these issues are worthy of consideration for DCs. Regardless of the profession in the healthcare system, however, the bottom line to implement health IT is to improve patient care. If this is what it's all about, adopting health IT should be a no-brainer. A strategic, well-thought-out plan will guide any healthcare provider down the right path.

This is where everyone in the industry should look beyond incentives and see adoption as a business imperative, especially if this truly is heading toward critical mass. Imagine if fully optimizing health IT is the standard practice in a few years. No matter what type of healthcare you practice, where do you want to be? Where do your patients, your colleagues, your payers want you to be? These are critical considerations.

Photo by jemsweb courtesy of Creative Commons license.