Do electronic medical records improve diabetes quality in physician practices?

To measure the effect of electronic medical records (EMRs) on a publicly reported composite measure indicating optimal diabetes care (ODC) rates in ambulatory settings.

Data from Minnesota Community Measurement on 557 clinics were used, including information on ODC, EMR adoption, and clinic characteristics.

A difference-in-differences strategy was used to estimate the impact of EMR adoption on patient outcomes while controlling for observed and unobserved clinic characteristics. Results were compared with a cross-sectional analysis of the same data.

EMRs had no observable effect on ODC for the average clinic during the first 2 years postadoption. EMRs may, however, generate modest (+4 percentage point) ODC increases for clinics in large, multisite practices. Cross-sectional analysis likely overestimates the effect of EMRs on quality.

There is little evidence that EMR adoption improves diabetes care during the first 2 years postadoption. This is notable as diabetes is a condition for which information technology has the potential to improve care management. The results suggest that policy makers should not expect public sector EMR investments to yield significant short-term improvements in publicly reported measures.