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Electronic health records (EHRs) can negatively affect physician satisfaction and workload; to manage requirements for visit documentation, some physicians have begun to employ medical scribes. In this study, conducted in two U.S. primary care practices (12 internists, 6 family physicians), researchers used physician and patient surveys to assess the effects of scribes. The physicians had no prior experience with scribes and were assigned to use or not use scribes for four alternating 3-month periods. More than 700 patients were surveyed at the end of each scribed period regarding visit quality and interaction time.
In scribed versus unscribed periods, a larger proportion of physicians spent <1 hour daily on EHR documentation (69% vs. 17%) a…