The Hidden Cost of Manual Timestamp Entry in the EHR

Every minute counts in the operating room. Yet across hospitals worldwide, a surprising inefficiency continues to drain productivity, predictability, and profit: manual timestamp entry in the Electronic Health Record (EHR).

This white paper exposes the hidden friction behind what seems like a minor administrative task — manually entering “wheels in” and “wheels out” times. The research, based on over 170,000 surgical cases, reveals that even a one-minute delay in documentation can cascade into lost surgical capacity, extended turnover times, and downstream workflow breakdowns that impact every corner of perioperative operations.

Readers will discover:

• How delayed timestamp entry quietly undermines team coordination, scheduling accuracy, and case throughput.

• Quantitative data showing how small documentation gaps accumulate into hours of lost surgical time per room per year.

• The human toll of manual processes, from cognitive fatigue to clinician burnout — and how automation can restore focus to patient care.

• A look ahead to AI-powered ambient sensing that captures workflow events in real time, eliminating latency and creating a frictionless OR environment.

The findings challenge healthcare leaders to rethink what “efficiency” means in the surgical setting — and why precision in data must match the precision of the surgery itself.

Access the full white paper to explore the data, see real-world case analyses, and understand how automated timestamping transforms both workflow and financial performance.