Lessons from Credit Bureaus for Improving the Market for Electronic Medical Records |
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| Authors: | CRAIG RICHARDSON MARK HALL ZAGROS MADJD-SADJADI |
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| Institution: | 1. Craig Richardson (richardsoncr@wssu.edu) is Associate Professor of Economics at Winston-Salem State University;2. Mark Hall (hallma@wfu.edu) is Fred D. & Elizabeth L. Turnage Professor of Law at Wake Forest University;3. Zagros Madjd-Sadjadi (sadjadizm@wssu.edu) is Associate Professor of Economics at Winston-Salem State University. |
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| Abstract: | Electronic medical records (EMRs) have tremendous potential to lower consumer medical costs and improve quality, yet their use in the United States remains extremely low. We explain the reasons for this market failure and then document the strikingly parallel problems in the lending market one hundred years ago. We investigate how the evolution of credit bureaus helped address market limitations in lending, and ask whether similar entities—what we call health information bureaus—might overcome similar problems in EMR adoption and interconnection. |
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