The EMR, or Regenstrief teaching electronic medical record system, was developed by the Regenstrief Institute, a private, nonprofit research organization affiliated with IUSM, and the school itself. The tEMR is a version of the medical record system used at Indianapolis-based Eskenazi Health.
Blaine Takesue, MD, assistant professor at IUSM, led the development of a training system that medical students use. The tEMR contains records of approximately 10,000 patients, though patient identities are “scrubbed” and identifying information is scrambled.
In an Inside Indiana Business report, Dr. Takesue said using actual patient data helps provide context and nuances about treating patients that medical students don’t get from a textbook.
“A textbook will talk about heart failure, but it won’t talk about heart failure and how to treat a patient who can’t afford their medicine,” he said in the report. “Or the patient with diabetes who has problems with transportation and calls the ambulance to go to the emergency room, because they don’t have transportation to see their regular doctor. A real EMR includes all those notes, so a student can read about a real-life patient and their struggles interacting with the medical system.”
tEMR is now a part of IUSM’s new curriculum and is currently used in a second-year course. In 2016, first-year medical students can use tEMR, and by 2018 students in all four years of medical school will be able to use it.
More articles on EHRs:
6 EHR vendor switches in 2015
AMA looks back on EHRs and progress in 2015: 5 takeaways
7 celebrity data breaches: When employees snoop on high-profile patients
