Spotlight on electronic health record errors: errors related to the use of default values
- Collection:
- Health Policy and Services Research
- Series Title(s):
- Pennsylvania patient safety advisory
- Author(s):
- Sparnon, Erin, author
- Contributor(s):
- Pennsylvania. Patient Safety Authority, issuing body. Institute for Safe Medication Practices, issuing body. ECRI (Organization), issuing body.
- Publication:
- [Harrisburg, Pa.] : Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority, [2013]
- Language(s):
- English
- Format:
- Text
- Subject(s):
- Electronic Data Processing Electronic Health Records Medical Errors -- prevention & control Medical Errors -- statistics & numerical data Medical Order Entry Systems Medication Errors -- prevention & control Medication Errors -- statistics & numerical data Software Equipment Design Equipment Safety Patient safety Humans Pennsylvania United States
- Genre(s):
- Technical Report
- Abstract:
- Hospitals use default values in electronic health record (EHR) systems in a variety of ways (e.g., prepopulating commonly prescribed dosing protocols, coordinating times for therapy delivery or lab draws). Using a keyword query, analysts identified 324 events related to EHR software defaults reported to the Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority. The three most commonly reported error types were wrong-time errors (n = 200), wrong-dose errors (n = 71), and inappropriate use of an automated stopping function (n = 28). Many of these reports also indicated a source of the erroneous data (n = 168), and the three most commonly reported sources were failure to change a default value (n = 128), user-entered values overwritten by the system (n = 19), and failure to completely enter information, causing the system to insert information into blank parameters (n = 16). Analysts also noted nine reports indicating that a default value needed to be updated to match current clinical practice. Facilities may wish to pay particular attention to the types and sources of error identified in this analysis when considering their use of default values in order sets, including consideration of how users view and enter time information, periodic review and change management, and differentiation between information that is user-entered versus overwritten or populated by the system.
- Copyright:
- Reproduced with permission of the copyright holder. Further use of the material is subject to CC BY-NC-ND license. (More information)
- Extent:
- 1 online resource (1 PDF file (pages 92-95)).
- NLM Unique ID:
- 101617002 (See catalog record)
- Permanent Link:
- http://resource.nlm.nih.gov/101617002