The Electronic Medical Record: Its Role in Disseminating Depression Guidelines in Primary Care Practice

Objective: Using the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research Depression Guideline Panel's recommendations as its focus, this article describes a step-by-step approach for disseminating a paper-based depression guideline to primary care physicians via a commercially available electronic medical record (EMR) system. Method: Description of the author's approach to disseminate an evidence-based depression treatment guideline to a group of primary care physicians using a commercially available EMR system and to evaluate the results. Results: We review clinical considerations and practical barriers faced in this process with the expectation that our experiences can guide others attempting to disseminate psychiatric treatment guideline via EMR systems. Conclusions: The EMR offers critical efficiencies in disseminating state-of-the-art clinical practice guidelines and in directing the primary care physicians' use of them. Still, well-designed, randomized controlled trials are necessary to demonstrate their effectiveness at enhancing patient outcomes for major depression in primary care settings.