The electronic health record is a major tool for physician management of his patient's care as well as assuring seamless care for the patient, including electronic referrals  for laboratory tests, imaging tests, consultations and electronic transmission of results back to the physician's computer;  electronic drug prescription, alerts  to the physician when his patient is due for chronic disease monitoring, such as Hemoglobin A1C monitoring for diabetes patients, or for early detection tests such as mammography.

The physician has access to all of the stored information on his patient and can see other physicians visited and their diagnoses, all of the patient's laboratory test results including for lab tests ordered by other physicians, all of the medications the patient is receiving including drugs prescribed by other physicians, and etc.

This enables the physician to have a comprehensive view of the patient's health status as well as treatment and this helps him make more intelligent and appropriate decisions for his patient's continued care. The electronic medical record also serves as the basis for on-line claims adjudication between the physician and the organization.