Even today, most information on patient care is transmitted between clinics and hospitals, and between generalists and specialists, by fax and telephone. A less efficient system is hard to imagine – other, that is, than attempting to coordinate patient care in the traditional way while undertaking the transition to electronic record keeping.
我最喜欢举的例子是电子病历（我的妻子是医生），其中存在着巨大的潜力去以提高美国医疗保健服务的效率。即便今时今日，大部分信息的病人诊疗信息依然是在诊所和医院之间，以及全科医生与专科医生之间，通过传真和电话进行传输。你很难想象有哪个系统比这个更缺乏效率——除了以传统方式协调病人护理的同时尝试过渡到电子病历。新的系统不断被安装，随后又因其不足之处而被弃用。不同的医疗诊所和医院都安装了不兼容且无法相互通信的系统。