International Journal of Medical Informatics
Volume 78, Issue 9 , Pages 571-578 , September 2009

Assessing the value of electronic prescribing in ambulatory care: A focus group study

  • Saul N. Weingart

      Affiliations

    • Center for Patient Safety, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA, United States
    • Division of General Medicine and Primary Care, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA, United States
    • Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States
    • Corresponding Author InformationCorresponding author at: Center for Patient Safety, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, 44 Binney St., Boston, MA 02115, United States. Tel.: +1 617 632 4935; fax: +1 617 632 3426.
    • ,
  • Michael Massagli

      Affiliations

    • PatientsLikeMe, Cambridge, MA, United States
    • ,
  • Adrienne Cyrulik

      Affiliations

    • Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, Boston, MA, United States
    • ,
  • Thomas Isaac

      Affiliations

    • Center for Patient Safety, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA, United States
    • Division of General Medicine and Primary Care, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA, United States
    • Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States
    • ,
  • Laurinda Morway

      Affiliations

    • Center for Patient Safety, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA, United States
    • ,
  • Daniel Z. Sands

      Affiliations

    • Division of General Medicine and Primary Care, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA, United States
    • Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States
    • Cisco, San Jose, CA, United States
    • ,
  • Joel S. Weissman

      Affiliations

    • Institute for Health Policy, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, United States
    • Executive Office of Health and Human Services, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Boston, MA, United States
    • University of Massachusetts Medical School, Worcester, MA, United States

Received 14 November 2008 ,Revised 17 March 2009 ,Accepted 19 March 2009.

References 

  1. Eslami S, de Keizer N, Abu-Hanna A. The impact of computerized physician medication order entry in hospitalized patients—a systematic review. Int. J. Med. Inform. 2008;77:365–376
  2. Papshev D, Peterson AM. Electronic prescribing in ambulatory practice: promises, pitfalls, and potential solutions. Am. J. Manage. Care. 2001;7:725–736
  3. Bates DW, Leape LL, Cullen DJ, Laird N, Petersen LA, Teich JM, et al. Effect of computerized physician order entry and a team intervention on prevention of serious medication errors. JAMA. 1998;280:1311–1316
  4. Bates DW, Teich JM, Lee J, Seger D, Kuperman GJ, Ma’Luf N, et al. The impact of computerized physician order entry on medication error prevention. J. Am. Med. Inform. Assoc. 1999;6:313–321
  5. Chertow GM, Lee J, Kuperman GJ, Burdick E, Horsky J, Seger DL, et al. Guided medication dosing for inpatients with renal insufficiency. JAMA. 2001;286:2839–2844
  6. Garg AX, Adhikari NK, McDonald H, Rosas-Arellano MP, Devereaux PJ, Beyene J, et al. Effects of computerized clinical decision support systems on practitioner performance and patient outcomes: a systematic review. JAMA. 2005;293:1223–1238
  7. Wolfstadt JI, Gurwitz JH, Field TS, Lee M, Kalkar S, Wu , et al. The effect of computerized physician order entry with clinical decision support on the rates of adverse drug events: a systematic review. J. Gen. Intern. Med. 2008;23:451–458
  8. Gandhi TK, Weingart SN, Seger AC, Borus J, Burdick E, Poon EG, et al. Outpatient prescribing errors and the impact of computerized prescribing. J. Gen. Intern. Med. 2005;20:837–841
  9. Gandhi TK, Weingart SN, Borus J, Seger AC, Peterson J, Burdick E, et al. Adverse drug events in ambulatory care. N. Engl. J. Med. 2003;348:1556–1564
  10. Feldstein AC, Smith DH, Perrin N, Yang X, Simon SR, Krall M, et al. Reducing warfarin medication interactions: an interrupted time series evaluation. Arch. Intern. Med. 2006;166:1009–1015
  11. Berner ES, Houston TK, Ray MN, Allison JJ, Heudebert GR, Chatham WW, et al. Improving ambulatory prescribing safety with a handheld decision support system: a randomized controlled trial. J. Am. Med. Inform. Assoc. 2006;13:171–179
  12. Weingart SN, Toth M, Sands DZ, Aronson MD, Davis RB, Phillips RS. Physicians’ decisions to override computerized drug alerts in primary care. Arch. Intern. Med. 2003;163:2625–2631
  13. Glassman PA, Belperio P, Simon B, Lanto A, Lee M. Exposure to automated drug alerts over time: effects on clinicians’ knowledge and perceptions. Med. Care. 2006;44:250–256
  14. Magnus D, Rodgers S, Avery AJ. GPs’ views on computerized drug interaction alerts: questionnaire survey. J. Clin. Pharm. Ther. 2002;27:377–382
  15. Ahearn MD, Kerr SJ. General practitioners’ perceptions of the pharmaceutical decision-support tools in their prescribing software. Med. J. Aust. 2003;179:34–37
  16. Spina JR, Glassman PA, Belperio P, Cader R, Asch S. Clinical relevance of automated drug alerts from the perspective of medical providers. Am. J. Med. Qual. 2005;20:7–14
  17. Ko Y, Abarca J, Malone DC, Dare DC, Geraets D, Houranieh A, et al. Practitioners’ views on computerized drug–drug interaction alerts in the VA system. J. Am. Med. Inform. Assoc. 2007;14:56–64
  18. Miles MB, Huberman AM. Qualitative Data Analysis: An Expanded Sourcebook. 2nd ed.. Thousand Oaks: Sage; 1994;
  19. Lapane KL, Waring ME, Schneider KL, Dubé C, Quilliam BJ. A mixed method study of the merits of e-prescribing drug alerts in primary care. J. Gen. Intern. Med. 2008;23:442–446
  20. Taylor LK, Tamblyn R. Reasons for physician non-adherence to electronic drug alerts. Stud. Health Technol. Inform. 2004;107(Pt 2):1101–1105
  21. Simon SR, Kaushal R, Cleary PD, Jenter CA, Volk LA, Orav EJ, et al. Physicians and electronic health records: a statewide survey. Arch. Intern. Med. 2007;167:507–512
  22. Grossman JM, Gerland A, Reed MC, Fahlman C. Physicians’ experiences using commercial e-prescribing systems. Health Aff. (Millwood). 2007;26:w393–w404
  23. Shah NR, Seger AC, Seger DL, Fiskio JM, Kuperman GJ, Blumenfeld B, et al. Improving acceptance of computerized prescribing alerts in ambulatory care. J. Am. Med. Inform. Assoc. 2006;13:5–11
  24. Krall MA, Sittig DF. Subjective assessment of usefulness and appropriate presentation mode of alerts and reminders in the outpatient setting. Proc. AMIA Symp. 2001;334–338
  25. Peterson JF, Bates DW. Preventable medication errors: identifying and eliminating serious drug interactions. J. Am. Pharm. Assoc. 2001;41:156–160
  26. The Joint Commission. “Safely implementing health information and converging technologies.” Sentinel Event Alert, December 11, 2008. Issue 42. Available at: http://www.jointcommission.org/SentinelEvents/SentinelEventAlert/sea_42.htm. Accessed January 26, 2009.
  27. Koppel R, Metlay JP, Cohen A, et al. Role of computerized physician order entry systems in facilitating medication errors. JAMA. 2005;293:1197–1203
  28. Han YY, Carcillo JA, Venkataraman ST, et al. Unexpected increased mortality after implementation of a commercially sold computerized physician order entry system. Pediatrics. 2005;116:1506–1512

PII: S1386-5056(09)00052-5

doi: 10.1016/j.ijmedinf.2009.03.007

International Journal of Medical Informatics
Volume 78, Issue 9 , Pages 571-578 , September 2009

Article Tools