EHRs are changing the way doctors behave

Researchers from Stanford University Department of Biomedical Informatics and Harvard Medical School examined the case of a two-year-old boy who died after clinical staff overrode EHR alerts about potential drug allergy cross-reactivity. Prior to inappropriately administering a diuretic to the patient, the clinical staff overrode more than 100 alerts over the course of one month.

"Excessive electronic alerts warning clinicians of potential but rare adverse drug cross-reactions result in increased patient safety risks by rendering these alerts meaningless," the authors wrote, adding, "The threat of missing a rare event must be balanced with the dangers of burdening clinicians with unnecessary and interruptive electronic alerts."

Read more: http://www.ihealthbeat.org/articles/2013/5/29/studies-analyze-how-ehr-us...


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