44 percent of practices use electronic health records

Nearly 44 percent of U.S. office-based physicians reported using all or partial electronic health record (EHR) systems in their practices, according to the preliminary results of a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS).

In last year's survey of 2,000 physicians, about 20.5 percent of respondents reported having basic systems, which include patient demographic information, patient problem lists, clinical notes, orders for prescriptions, and viewing laboratory and imaging results.

Only 6.3 percent reported having fully functional systems, which also include medical history and follow-up, orders for tests, prescription and test orders sent electronically, warnings of drug interactions, and reminders for guideline-based interventions. The remaining 17.2 percent of respondents reported having partial EHR systems. From 2007 to 2008, physicians' use of any EHR system increased by 18.7 percent.