Penza, 4 December 2012. PenzaNews. Specialists in all health care institutions of the Penza region will keep patient records in electronic form beginning with 2013. This was announced by the head of regional informatization department Alexander Antonov.

“It is assumed that from January, the doctors will no longer fill out paper medical forms, but instead enter all the information about the patient into their computer,” he stated.

According to Alexander Antonov, the new development will significantly reduce the time of an appointment, and eliminate patients’ confusion regarding their diagnosis.

“It is a common knowledge that the handwriting of many doctors is often hard to understand, not only for the patients, but also for their colleagues. Electronic medical history will enable a doctor to get acquainted with the diagnosis of a patient, even if it was made in another health care institution of the Penza region,” the agency interlocutor underlined.

He added that all paper records of the patients, the most important data from which will also be transferred into electronic form, within a year will be stored in the archive.