The electronic patient record in the twenty-first century: the required contributions of information science

Abstract

The electronic health record raises informational and technological issues, including some that can be addressed using knowledge from the information science field and from informational professionals. To explore these issues, this article departs from the scope of electronic health record and establishes possible connections within the scope of information science. In these connections, information from literature reviews was combined with knowledge obtained by observation of contexts of health records production and use, by observation and analysis of health records in different formats and from different institutions, and by contact with health professionals, information professionals, computing professionals, managers, and researchers that work directly with health records. Results describe informational and technological issues of electronic health record that are related to the processes of creation, communication, identification, selection, acquisition, organization and retrieval, storage, preservation, analysis and synthesis, and assessment of information. Conclusions show that in the 21st Century, the electronic health record, when considered in its local, regional, national and international dimensions, presents issues that are adequate to the purposeful activity of information professionals, and constitutes research field for the information science, which can contribute to health improvement and, simultaneously, can expand, test, and refine its theories, hypotheses, and methodologies.