EMR is a good idea, but can only work if it is designed for medical professionals to communicate, and not to satisfy insurance billing requirements. To do this the notes must be intentionally written by the physician, and kept subsanitive, and not overly detailed or lenghty. Otherwise we’ll end up with a useless glut of extraineous information, that can be sent electronically around the world in an instant. The only benificiaries if the EMR as it is developing will be the trees. Provided nobody decides to hit the “print” button and flood the ward with the same useless information.

IT industry for billions of sales

Policy wonks and insurers for the potential to control doctor-patient relationships at the point rather than reactively

Politicians for the ability to promise something for nothing.

The idea that EMR will save money also sells well because it feeds into some of our most powerful biases that have commonly led to wasteful bad decisions:

Excessive confidence in our ability to predict the outcome of our efforts.

A tendency to repeatedly ignore the ubiquity of unintended consequences.

The traditional American confidence in technological solutions.

The general tendency around the world for the last hundred years towards striving for ever greater centralized control and confidence–despite the murderous record of collectivism–that with enough centralized control all problems can be solved.