While survey data are conflicting and incomplete, it seems likely that more than a third of family physicians are now using electronic health record systems (EHRs). The remaining two-thirds presumably range from those just about ready to make the leap to those who have no intention of abandoning paper records.

If you use an EHR, chances are good you've given advice to one or two colleagues who aren't as far along. But if another third of family physicians are near enough the decision point to be thinking seriously about EHRs, that's tens of thousands all thirsty for knowledge and wallowing in the same bog of uncertainty that you had to slog through. You now have a timely opportunity to share your knowledge with all of them.

“Electronic Health Records: The 2007 FPM User-Satisfaction Survey,” which appeared in the April issue and is now available online, is designed to capture your knowledge in a form that will allow us to publish product specific user-satisfaction information about a number of popular EHR systems. The first version of this survey, published two years ago,¹ pooled the wisdom of more than 400 family physicians; this year, with continuing growth in EHR adoption and a more experienced body of family-physician EHR users, we hope to be able to provide even more useful information based on an even larger number of responses.

If you are an AAFP member who uses an EHR system, I urge you to complete the survey, which is available online at https://www.aafp.org/fpm/ehrsurvey. Please complete the survey even if you answered the 2005 version; your system and your attitudes have almost certainly evolved since then. And please urge a colleague or two – those in your practice or another practice with electronic records – to do the same. We're not looking for a representative sample of EHR users. We're looking for a large body of family physicians who are willing to turn their experience into advice for fellow family physicians still trying to figure out which way to go.