- Title
- Unification of electronic health records and holistic medicine
- Creator
- Venkatraman, Sitalakshmi; Stranieri, Andrew
- Date
- 2012
- Type
- Text; Journal article
- Identifier
- http://researchonline.federation.edu.au/vital/access/HandleResolver/1959.17/72622
- Identifier
- vital:6967
- Identifier
- https://www.cmb.ac.lk/wp-content/uploads/Unification_of_Electronic_Heaith.pdf
- Identifier
- ISSN:
- Abstract
- Recent trends in the increasing use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) as "holistic medicine" by patients in technologically advanced nations have prompted the need to integrate their CAM information into their Electronic health records (EHR). Studies indicate that over 70% of the public in Australia used at least one form of CAM that includes nutritional products such as vitamins, supplements, and herbal medicines, and alternate medicines such as homoeopathic, Ayurvedic and Chinese medicines. There is also a growing acceptance of CAM among healthcare providers, and patients are increasingly visiting CAM practitioners. In this paper, we argue that by unifying patients' information about their CAM history along with their EHR, the healthcare quality and accuracy of measurements could be improved, and we identify six key benefits for healthcare and CAM practitioners as well as consumers. On the other hand we also foresee certain issues, such as availability of electronic data and standardised practice of different forms of CAM, and we have unearthed six main issues that require prime attention. We discuss these issues and provide recommendations for the way to go forward in integrating automated CAM software components into EHR systems.
- Relation
- ICHM 2012 Vol. , no. (2012), p.53-59
- Rights
- Copyright ICHM
- Rights
- Open Access
- Rights
- This metadata is freely available under a CCO license
- Subject
- Electronic health record; EHR; Complementary and alternative medicine; CAM; Unification; Integration issues
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