Unintended Consequences of Nationwide Electronic Health Record Adoption: Challenges and Opportunities in the Post-Meaningful Use Era

This follow-on article moves the discussion forward by adding further dimension to the issue of unintended consequences from the perspective of the United States health system.

Unintended Consequence 2: Electronic Health Record Market Saturation

The time frame to implement MU's certification criteria was constrained, and the larger EHR vendors more rapidly complied with the criteria, contributing to an increased adoption of systems with established market share. In 2017, the top 3 US HIT vendors shared 66% of the EHR market for acute care hospitals, which includes most large academic medical centers. Given the complexity and high cost involved in implementing a commercial EHR, health care organizations are unlikely to change an EHR vendor anytime soon, causing a saturation of the US EHR market.