Survey evaluating physicians' experiences with an initiative aimed at improving their EHR use

In this case report, we describe an initiative to improve physicians’
experience with Electronic Health Records (EHRs), which was one of several
strategies developed within our hospital to reduce physician burnout
possibly connected to the EHR. We propose a 10 member “EHR SWAT Team” with
representation from clinical, educational, technical and project
management staff. This team met with physicians across all hospital
divisions to collect their issues with the EHR and requests for
functionality changes. The team then reviewed these requests, prioritized
and fixed them in a timely manner. Through in-person meetings, the EHR
SWAT Team gathered 118 issues or change requests, 36.4% of which were
related to education and 17% of which were quick fixes. Popular requests
included improved search functionality, auto-faxing and auto-saving of
notes. 46 physicians completed our short evaluation survey, where 61.3%
said that it increased their proficiency in using the EHR. We highlight
five important lessons learned from carrying out this initiative including
the importance of engaging Information Technology (IT) leadership,
physician leadership, and physicians across the hospital. Our next steps
include measuring the impact of this initiative on EHR-related burnout
through an organizational wide survey and objective back-end usage logs.