Electronic Medical Records or EMR is the electronic version of the paper-based record of a patient.  As with any old or new system, there are both advantages and disadvantages to electronic medical records. Below are some of the advantages of an Electronic Medical Record.

1. Many say that investing in an EMR is costly, but come to think it, in the long run, it will also be a great savings.
2. EMR is a space saver. No need to keep paper files on folders and storage cabinets, you just need to encode the patients files on the computer.
3. EMR can also help the environment in the reduction of paper use in health care facilities.
4. EMR has the ability to store and share information easier and more convenient to authorized persons.  Multiple health care professionals or doctors can access the patient’s record simultaneously from  anywhere, this makes the record immediately available.
5. EMR is more readable compared to handwritten charts.  It is common knowledge that health care practitioners have handwriting that is quite hard to read, electronically transferred files can be more readable and accurate.
6. EMR has a back up and disaster recovery system making it much more reliable and safer compared to paper-based records.
7. EMR still promotes patient data confidentiality. Access to these records can be restricted and monitored automatically. Each authorized person has only a specific level of access to the data.
8. EMR has the ability to be sorted out in a way the doctor needs to see. It can recall data by date stored, by disease, by condition, or by prescription.
9. EMR data can not only store the patient’s data, it can also link the data to a reference information in the internet.
10. EMR data can be printed in a way that the most important data can be highlighted.