More on microcontexts.
One of the key advantages of creating an electronic medical record is the opportunity to provide intelligent decision support at the time of the decision rather than retrospectively. This is especially true in emergency medicine. High-stakes, time-sensitive decisions are made on a daily basis, and now we can use evidence-based medicine to bring practice guidelines and other job aids to the bedside. One example of this kind is an interactive chart tool that has built in logic for various clinical scenarios. This sort of tool contains reminders to ask certain key risk-associated questions while composing the chart note. It's crucial to have synchronicity in order for these tools to work. These job aids are usually very simple algorithms that could easily be coded for a small form factor device, with the output being a text snippet to be added to the full encounter note.