Undergrads Teach Tech for Docs

If you've ever had to rely on a 10-year-old child to program your DVR or demystify the intricacies of your smartphone, you'll appreciate this: Pre-med students from Penn State University are teaching doctors at a local hospital how to use electronic health records.

The chief medical information officer at Mount Nittany Medical Center turned to Penn State when he realized physicians would have to use the new EHR system by the end of this year for the hospital to qualify for federal "meaningful use" financial incentives, according to an article published online by the university's news service.

Worried about coordinating schedules of all 250 physicians for training sessions in just a few months, Stephen Tingley turned instead to Penn State's pre-med student community, according to the article. He interviewed and assessed the teaching abilities of 145 students before selecting 30 of them--including one from Duquesne University--for the summer program.

Working in shifts, the students are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week to get doctors up to speed on the ins and outs of EHRs.

The program ends Aug. 19, which makes some of Mount Nittany's physicians a little nervous.

"They're well-educated on the program and have been doing a great job instructing us on how to use it," cardiologist Jeff Eaton is quoted as saying. "The system is not easy to figure out; it's so different, like a maze. I'm dreading the day when they're not here."