“The primary care system in England is virtually all electronic. The driving force behind that initially … was stand-alone prescription systems,” he said.
It is not clear how physicians in this country will feel about adopting an electronic prescribing system that is not integrated with electronic medical records, but “there's no question it's a step up from paper,” said Dr. Pace.
Who's on Board?
Members of the National ePrescribing Patient Safety Initiative include:
Aetna
Allscripts Inc.
Cisco Systems
Dell Inc.
Fujitsu Computers of America
Microsoft Corp.
Sprint Nextel
SureScripts
WellPoint
Wolters Kluwer Health
12 regional health care organizations