Study Explains Errors Caused by EHR Default Values - With Only Four Reports of "Temporary" (By the Grace of God) Patient Harm

From Health Data Management and the Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority:Study Explains Errors Caused by EHR Default ValueJoseph Goedert Sept. 5, 2013 A new study analyzes errors related to “default values” which are standardized medication order sets in electronic health records and computerized physician order entry systems.The Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority, an independent state agency, conducted the study. “Default values are often used to add standardization and efficiency to hospital information systems,” says Erin Sparnon, an analyst with the authority and study author. “For example, a healthy patient using a pain medication after surgery would receive a certain medication, dose and delivery of the medication already preset by the health care facility within the EHR system for that type of surgery.”These presets are the default value, but safety issues can arise if the defaults are not appropriately used. Sparnon studied 324 verified safety reports, noting that 314, or 97 percent, resulted in no harm. Six others were reported as unsafe conditions that caused no harm and four reports caused temporary harm involving some level of intervention.One might ask:  how many unreported or yet-to-be-reported EHR/CPOE cases involved, or will involve, permanent harm?Regarding the "temporary harms", one which includes "default times" as opposed to doses:The four cases requiring intervention involved accepting a default dose of a muscle r...
Source: Health Care Renewal - Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Tags: Erin Sparnon healthcare IT risk Health Data Management default values Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority HIT Policy Committee Source Type: blogs