Dive Brief:
- Tom Smith of Smithville, Mo. was reluctant to call his doctor's office, but comfortable using its Cerner portal.
- One day, after going through a series of symptoms including dark stools, dizzy spells and stomach pain, he used the portal to write to his doctor, who asked that Smith come into the office right away.
- As it turned out, Smith had a pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor; the patient tells Physicians Practice that he might have ignored the symptoms and died if he hadn't had the portal to use.
Dive Insight:
Clearly, this is exactly what we hope will happen when doctors put portals in place -- that patients feel comfortable connecting to their doctors and that doctors use the connection to solve problems. Let's hope that as patients increasingly use portals, that they'll reach out as Smith did and avoid needless tragedies.