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A study of general internal medicine physicians from 2 ambulatory practice networks evaluated whether reserving protected time for EHR tasks—such as messaging, prior authorizations, or medication refills—affects physician productivity and hands-on EHR time. Researchers compared 130 general internal medicine physicians (41 in the intervention group and 89 in the control group) from November 2021 to June 2024 and set aside 1 appointment slot per half-day (20-30 minutes) dedicated to asynchronous EHR tasks. As published in JAMA Network Open, the intervention was associated with an immediate relative decline of 13.3 work relative value units (RVUs) per week (P<.001), followed by a gradual increase of 0.43 RVUs per week (P=.002). However, after-hours EHR time dropped by 24.8 minutes per week and non-workday EHR time dropped by 28.6 minutes per week.
Done and done: Overall, the authors suggest that reserving this dedicated time for EHR work can reduce the amount of time used for after-hours and non-workday EHR tasks without compromising productivity, which can reduce burnout for clinical teams. Find out how to improve timely documentation in urgent care in this recent JUCM feature: Improving Chart Closure Time in a Pediatric Urgent Care Setting