Interesting Review Of Health IT Safety Events. These Are The Areas We Need To Focus On.

These reports appeared a little while ago.

ECRI analysis reveals HIT problems

By Bernie Monegain, Editor

Created 02/07/2013

Data transfer, data entry, system configurations and more are identified as serious problem areas for healthcare IT in a new report by ECRI Institute, a patient safety organization.

Concerned about the unintended consequences of HIT and the potential for errors to cause patient harm, ECRI Institute Patient Safety Organization (PSO) recently conducted what it calls a “PSO Deep Dive” analysis on HIT-related safety events. The organization’s 48-page report identified five potential problem areas.

"Minimizing the unintended consequences of HIT systems and maximizing the potential of HIT to improve patient safety should be an ongoing focus of every healthcare organization," Karen P. Zimmer, MD, medical director, ECRI Institute PSO, said in a news release.

Based on reports submitted to the PSO from participating organizations, ECRI Institute PSO identified the following key HIT-related problems:

• Inadequate data transfer from one HIT system to another
• Data entry in the wrong patient record
• Incorrect data entry in the patient record
• Failure of the HIT system to function as intended
• Configuration of the system in a way that can lead to mistakes

More here:

http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/ecri-analysis-reveals-hit-problems

There is also coverage here:

Data transfer issues for HIT systems a major safety concern

February 7, 2013 | By Dan Bowman

Data transfer between health IT systems often is inadequate from a patient-safety perspective, according to a new analysis of HIT-related safety events by the ECRI Institute Patient Safety Organization.

In its report, for which 171 health IT events were examined at 36 facilities between April and June of last year, the Plymouth Meeting, Pa., nonprofit organization identified five potential problem areas for such events. In addition to inadequate data transfer, researchers said that other notable health IT related problems included systems not functioning as intended; poor system configurations; inaccurate data entry in patient records; and data entry in the wrong patient records.

"Health IT's promise for improved patient safety and healthcare delivery is great, but so too are its risks of jeopardizing patient safety and care if organizations fail to address, throughout the life cycle of any health IT project, the issues raised by this Deep Dive report," the authors wrote. "As healthcare facilities respond to government incentives to adopt health IT, they must also keep their attention focused on how systems affect safety to ensure that the benefits of health IT can be realized."

A breakdown of the events found that more than half (53 percent) were associated with medication management systems. Of the systems identified in such events, computerized physician order entry systems were mentioned the most (25 percent of the time). Clinical documentation systems also were implicated in a good portion (17 percent) of such events.

More (with links) here:

http://www.fiercehealthit.com/story/data-transfer-issues-between-hit-systems-major-safety-concern/2013-02-07

This is definitely a report to be carefully reviewed by all involved in Health IT.

David.