NY Times: The End of Prescriptions as we Know Them in New York

[LiberalElite]

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/15/nyregion/new-york-to-discard-prescription-pads-and-doctors-handwriting-in-digital-shift.html

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“It really is not a complicated thing,” Ms. Cota told them, speaking loudly over the bustle of patients and emergency room staff. “We just have to get used to it.”

Starting on March 27, the way prescriptions are written in New York State will change. Gone will be doctors’ prescription pads and famously bad handwriting. In their place: pointing and clicking, as prescriptions are created electronically and zapped straight to pharmacies in all but the most exceptional circumstances.

New York is the first state to require that all prescriptions be created electronically and to back up that mandate with penalties, including fines and imprisonment, for physicians who fail to comply. Minnesota has a law requiring electronic prescribing but does not penalize doctors who cling to pen and paper.
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xposted in GD

[SheilaT]

1. They're a bit behind the times.

I've been getting printed scripts for years now in other states. And for the past two or three years my scripts have been seen directly to the provider.

I'm being reminded of lawyers, and how they file various suits. I was a paralegal about ten years ago in Kansas. Old time attorneys were still resisting computers, but right around that point the state of Kansas put its foot down and told all the attorneys that all lawsuits needed to be filed electronically. Either join the 21st century or shut down.

My question is, What took NYS so long?