Blumenthal slams EHR critics

David Blumenthal, MD, the national coordinator for health IT, took a swipe at a recent study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine that showed that the use of electronic health records did not significantly improve the quality of patient care, even when they were used with clinical decision support systems that help health professionals make clinical decisions to better manage care for patients. During a question and answer session with reporters at last week's Direct Project health information exchange launch, Blumenthal said that the database used and the timeframe in which the study was conducted were contributors to flawed results. He also said EHR technology has improved since the study was done.