My office did a massive upgrade on our electronic medical record at the end of February. We have had an electronic medical record (EMR) for over five years. The system we use is very agile and adaptable because it allows us to customize most of it. They give us the tools and the supplies and we build it. Then we embellish it. At the onset, the task of the original customization fell to me. Again, it is my task. I have spent my night migrating, rewriting and creating new data trees. Ultimately, it will make for a cleaner progress note. But, it is an extreme version of programming your VCR. Granted, technology is far more intuitive than10 years ago, but the VCR was a bitch to program. Even with the instruction booklet. But, once you learned it, it was a knowledge set you would not lose. This is similar. I was admittedly rusty and the new software has been redesigned on the back end as well as the front end. So, I have some navigation issues. But….I solved the issue facing us today and now I can just let that section embellish itself and I can move on to the next item on the list.
Oh, it all of life was so amendable and customizable. The idea has a niche following: the Scion cars are a great example. What does the commercial call them? The little deviants? It is an interesting contemplation. To be customizable means you are an original. While you can certainly accept the “factory” basics and remain just like everyone else; you can also change components or even upgrade. All the alteration makes for a unique experience and existence. It is not homogenized. And in family medicine, how could any believe patients can be homogenized? Each is unique, varied and different. It is what makes this speciality so fantastic. Each door I open, each exam room I enter, each story I hear…..is different. It is the spice of life to be open to new and original things.
It has been a good day.