Date of Award

6-2013

Document Type

Open Access

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

Economics

First Advisor

Tomas Dvorak

Language

English

Keywords

electronic records, emergency rooms, hospital, medicine

Abstract

A key concern in emergency departments (EDs) is their overall efficiency, One proposed solution to making EDs more efficient is the use of electronic medical records (EMRs). This paper seeks to determine if varying levels of EMR sophistication have an effect on measures of emergency department efficiency. Furukawa (2011) found that EMR sophistication had varying effects on ED efficiency. Fully functional EMRs significantly improved ED efficiency in multiple measures, while basic EMR varied on its effects on efficiency. Since Furukawa’s results are somewhat inconclusive, this study aims to see if these effects are longstanding. I hypothesize that as EMR became more established, their effect on efficiency would become stronger. To this end, I used the 2009 National Hospital Ambulatory Care Survey (NHAMCS). I found that EMR sophistication does not have a strong association with ED efficiency. Five separate OLS regressions were used for five measures of ED efficiency. In order to account for possible endogeneity within the EMR related regressors, instrumental variables were used. In summary, based on the findings of this study and previous literature, it would seem that EMR sophistication does not conclusively affect ED efficiency.

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