Kaiser Permanente's Electronic Health Records Project Has Technical Problems

Main Category: IT / Internet / E-mail
Also Included In: Health Insurance / Medical Insurance
Article Date: 21 Feb 2007 - 4:00 PDT

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Kaiser Permanente's $4 billion effort "to create one of the largest and most ambitious" electronic health records projects in the nation has experienced "repeated technical problems" that potentially have been dangerous to patients, the Los Angeles Times reports. The HMO, which is in the process of computerizing the medical records of its 8.6 million members, has fully implemented its EHR system -- called Health Connect -- at two hospitals, and it plans to expand it to more than 30 additional hospitals over the next two years. According to an internal Kaiser Permanente report, Health Connect was operational 88% of the time on some days and less than 80% in certain locations between Feb. 27, 2006, and Nov. 5, 2006 -- numbers that are "considered very low" by EHR experts, the Times reports. The health care industry "increasingly is aiming for systems with availability in the 'multiple nines' or 99.99%," according to the Times. System failures require hospital staff to revert to paper records, a transition that causes an increased risk of error. The Kaiser Permanente report documents nearly two dozen cases in which EHR problems might have placed patient safety at risk during the nine-month period. According to documents and employees, the primary reasons for the failures were problems with technological infrastructure and power. The California Department of Managed Health Care recently requested information about the program and might conduct a formal investigation. Justen Deal, a Kaiser project supervisor who was placed on leave in November 2006 after sending an e-mail that was critical of Health Connect, said, "We were told this would be a panacea, but it's not that. The truth is there are a lot of people inside the company who are worried the project is costing too much and is putting patients at risk." Bruce Turkstra, interim chief information officer for Kaiser Permanente, said that the problems have been corrected and that the system now is operational 99.2% of the time. Kaiser Permanente CEO George Halverson said the project "couldn't be going better" considering that it is "one of the largest and most ambitious efforts anywhere in the world to modernize our health care system" (Costello, Los Angeles Times, 2/15).Please note: The Kaiser Family Foundation is not associated with Kaiser Permanente or Kaiser Industries.

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