Ambulatory EHR System

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Acute refers to inpatient care while ambulatory refers to outpatient care. An acute setting is a medical facility in which patients remain under constant care. An ambulatory setting might be a non-medical facility like a school or nursing home, but it also includes clinics and medical settings that typically deal with non-emergency issues. The line between the two can get blurry because an urgent care clinic is still considered an ambulatory setting even though it receives patients with possibly life-threatening symptoms. Ambulatory EHR vs Inpatient EHR Inpatient EHR systems were designed to manage inpatient data. Therefore, inpatient EHR systems are most commonly used by hospitals. From an IT perspective, a hospital isn’t a single entity, …show more content…

Physicians use these systems to collect detailed, specific information about each patient, providing complete documentation of their personal health records. The history documented includes injuries, diagnoses, treatments, prescriptions, visits and much more. This comprehensive database helps physicians see the big medical picture, which in turn makes future diagnosis easier. Health care businesses have capitalized on this information by providing practices with patient portals. Integrating an ambulatory EHR solution with a patient portal gives patients access to their up-to-date medical records. In recent years, this has become more of a necessary EHR feature than a “nice-to-have” …show more content…

Inpatient EHR certification focuses mostly on orders and medication management. The features required to fulfill this need include electronic medication administration records and medication reconciliation. Ambulatory EHR certification, on the other hand, requires more patient-centric capabilities. For example, e-Prescribing, patient reminders, clinical summaries and timely access are just a few of ambulatory EHR certification requirements. There are, however, several similarities between the two types of certifications. As with most healthcare systems, security and note taking are high priorities, as are drug-to-drug and drug-to-allergy interaction checks. Additionally, physician support in the form of computerized provider order entry (CPOE) and clinical decision support is required for both

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