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EmailPosted on June 7, 2016 by Chad Leaver
Managing how patients receive medications during a hospital stay is a complex inter-professional process involving physician, nursing, pharmacist and administrative staff. In Canada, the various steps for prescribing, communicating the medication order, dispensing, administering and monitoring for drug interactions are still mostly manual and paper-based.
Computerized provider order entry (CPOE) has demonstrated itself as a critical strategic resource that can be used as part of a hospital’s electronic clinical information system in order to improve patient safety and outcomes, while eliminating delays in a manual and paper-based medication management process.1,2 Currently, only a few hospitals in Canada have fully implemented CPOE, and based on the latest hospital EMR adoption model HIMSS scores, there’s a significant lag in Canadian hospital adoption of CPOE. Comparatively, Canada is well behind the US and other advanced western health care systems.
To accelerate CPOE in Canada, Infoway invested with leading health care organizations to further advance the complex journey towards CPOE implementation and adoption in Canadian hospitals. The results of this work included the development of key learnings and evidence-informed resources now available online at the Canadian CPOE Toolkit.
References:
1. http://www.longwoods.com/publications/healthcare-quarterly/457
2. http://jamia.oxfordjournals.org/content/20/3/470.short
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Chad leads national research, evaluation and communication efforts for Infoway’s Evaluation Services and Consumer Health & Innovation investment portfolios.
