Satisfaction and perceived quality of an electronic medical record system in a tertiary hospital in Oman

Objective: To evaluate the knowledge, attitude and practice (KAP) of physicians towards the Electronic Medical Record (EMR) system. Methods: A cross-sectional survey including physicians from various clinical specialties was conducted. An existing questionnaire was adapted to assess the KAP of physicians towards the EMR system. Information was analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software. Results: Out of 200 distributed questionnaires, 141 (70.5%) responses were received. Overall, only 22 physicians (15.6%) rated the current EMR system as an effective tool. A substantial proportion (29.4%) of respondents considered EMR not worth the time and effort required to use it. The majority (67.4%) reported increasing difficulty with the performance of work after applying the EMR system. The overall quality of work was perceived not to have changed (41.2% of the respondents) or declined (27.4% of the respondents). The low satisfaction and underperformance was found to be associated with younger age (p=0.032), junior designation (p=0.041), and low familiarity with computers (p=0.047). Conclusion: We report low satisfaction and perceived quality of work among physicians in our institution with the current EMR system. Inappropriate and inadequate usage of the system was found to be the main cause of the underlying poor satisfaction.