Medicare awards doctors for moving to e-prescribing

NEW YORK This month, Medicare began giving doctors extra money for moving from paper prescribing to e-prescribing.

The private sector has moved to encourage doctors to adopt e-prescribing as well, including health plans and companies that make e-prescribing technology. Today, about 70,000 independent physicians prescribe over the Internet.

E-prescribing is already standard in many countries, but adoption of the practice has lagged in the United States, partially because oflaws that require paper-based prescribing of some drugs such as narcotics.

Studies have shown that e-prescribing can reduce costs and prescription errors.