Through practices of reading and writing, the medical record functions as a constitutive element of current medical work. It enters into the 'thinking' processes of medical personnel and into their relations with patients and with each other. It helps to shape the form the patient's trajectory takes, and it is actively involved in the transformation of the patient's body into an 'extension' of the hospital's routines. The record, as a distributor and collector of work tasks, allows a high level of complexity in the organisation of work - yet its own functioning is constantly amended, repaired, and played upon by the same staff members whose work practices it transforms. |
Extract from Berg 1996 |