Policies promoting widespread adoption of electronic medical records (EMRs) are premised on the hope that they can improve the coordination of care. Yet little is known about whether and how physician practices use current EMRs to facilitate coordination.

In May 2010, a team of researchers from the Center for Studying Health System Change (HSC), as part of the Community Tracking Study (CTS), visited the northern New Jersey metropolitan area to study how health care is organized, financed and delivered in that community.

Health information technology (HIT) holds promise for facilitating vast improvements in care and, ultimately, in the health of Americans,1,2 but achieving that potential remains a daunting task.

There is emerging consensus that enhanced inter-professional teamwork is necessary for the effective and efficient delivery of primary care, but there is less practical information specific to primary care available to guide practices on how to better work as teams.

Despite expectations that medical homes provide “24 × 7 coverage†there is little to guide primary care practices in developing sustainable models for accessible and coordinated after–hours care.