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Electronic Medical Records Critical for Telehealth

Michael Haschker leads discussion around new telehealth equipment at the sixth annual Telehealth Summit of South Carolina in Columbia.
Tabitha Safdi/SCETV

As technology changes the way patients and health care providers see each other, it’s also changing how our doctors document our health records.

More practices in South Carolina are using telehealth equipment, allowing clinicians to connect to patients through video. The South Carolina Telehealth Alliance’s Michael Haschker says integrating an electronic medical records system into that equipment is crucial for the success of any telehealth program.

Most office-based physicians use some kind of electronic medical record system, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but each practice or health group uses it’s own record.

That means different practices have different records for the same patient. Steve Chies, who chairs the Health Information Technology Committee of the American Health Care Association, says finding a way to connect all records into one comprehensive network is a massive undertaking – but it’s a priority in the health care industry.