"These results showcase a major disconnect between the goals of the government's EHR incentive program for providers, and the implementation of these systems," Georgiann DeCenzo, executive vice president of Advanstar Medical Communications Group, said in a statement. "Physicians are giving the health care information technology sector valuable insight on their customers' preferences, and vendors should factor this into their future development plans."

The Obama administration has offered incentives to doctors who adopt EHRs, and assessed penalties to those who don't. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Marilyn Tavenner said EHRs will "improve the way care is delivered while lowering costs."

According to the Department of Health and Human Services, EHR adoption has tripled since 2010, increasing to 44 percent in 2012 and computerized physician order entry has more than doubled (increasing 168 percent) since 2008.

But the Medical Economics survey is the latest showing doctors' frustration with the technology. In 2013 analysis from the RAND Corp., for example, researchers said despite huge investments in them, cost savings are still elusive. That's mostly due to the "sluggish adoption of health IT systems," coupled with the choice of systems that are neither interoperable nor easy to use; and the failure of health care providers and institutions to reengineer care processes to reap the full benefits of health IT.

Additionally, the Medical Economics survey found:

• 67 percent of physicians say that system functionality influences their decisions to purchase or switch systems.
• 48 percent say that cost is influencing their decisions to purchase or switch systems.  
• 45 percent say they have spent more than $100,000 on an EHR
• 77 percent of the largest practices (more than 10 physicians) spent more than $200,000 on an EHR.
• 38 percent doubt their systems will still be viable in five years.