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Time. It’s something we all wish we had more of in one aspect of our lives or another. But, for many clinicians, more time for their personal lives seems harder than ever to come by. For them, more time is not just of the essence. It’s of the necessity.

The term “work-life balance” is so commonplace that the Oxford dictionary has decided to permanently include it among its pages. Defined as, “The number of hours per week you spend working, compared with the number of hours you spend with your family, relaxing, etc.”, this phrase is more popular than ever among members of today’s workforce.

Physicians make their money and make a difference by seeing patients. Yet doctors and their support staff are spending more and more time with documentation and administrative work. This has led to record levels of burn-out among healthcare professionals.

On a sunny afternoon in May, 2015, I joined a dozen other surgeons at a downtown Boston office building to begin sixteen hours of mandatory computer training. We sat in three rows, each of us parked behind a desktop computer. In one month, our daily routines would come to depend upon mastery of Epic, the new medical software system on the screens in front of us. The upgrade from our home-built software would cost the hospital system where we worked, Partners HealthCare, a staggering $1.6 billion, but it aimed to keep us technologically up to date.

Physicians are spending twice as much time on electronic health records as they are face to face with patients, according to a new study by the American Medical Association.

Researchers observed 57 physicians in four specialties (family medicine, internal medicine, cardiology, and orthopedics) and found that for every hour of direct clinical face time with patients, nearly 2 additional hours is spent on EHR and desk work within the clinic day.

Some clinicians are turning to medical scribes to reduce the time spent managing electronic health records (EHRs). In fact, incorporating medical scribes into surgical practice increases the number of patients seen, according to research findings presented at the American College of Surgeons Clinical Congress 2019.

The first randomized controlled trial of scribes finds that they produce significant improvements in physician satisfaction without detracting from patient satisfaction.

The use of scribes—team members who document patient encounters in real time under physician supervision—has gained considerable popularity as a strategy to decrease physicians' clerical burden...

Medical scribes can accurately document physician or independent practitioner dictation and activities, allowing providers to spend more time with patients, according to an article published Oct. 10 in Medical Economics. Maxine Lewis, president of Medical Coding & Reimbursement in Cincinnati, discusses the role of scribes in medical practices.

It’s common knowledge that doctors work long hours. From late nights studying in medical school to the 28-hour shifts many young doctors experience during residency, physicians are conditioned to push their bodies and minds to the extreme in pursuit of a noble goal – making patients better. What if, however, those very patients are adversely affecting their doctor’s well-being?