Survey: Too many EHR alerts could lead to missing test results

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Survey: Too many EHR alerts could lead to missing test results IT Survey: Privacy, ICD-
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By Andis Robeznieks
Posted: March 4, 2013 - 4:00 pm ET Healthcare job growth
Tags: Electronic Health Records (EHR), Patient Care, Patient Safety, Physicians in Rust Belt may be
unsustainable
The information deluge unleashed by electronic health-record systems could cause physicians to miss notifications of
Editorial: New
abnormal test results, according to a survey of primary-care practitioners with the U.S. Veterans Affairs Department.
technology requires
Missing those notifications could delay needed care for patients, according to the physicians, nurse practitioners and
March 4, 2013 new ways to pay for it
physicians assistants surveyed.
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Researchers from several Houston institutions—including the Houston VA Health Services Research and Development industry sectors in
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Center of Excellence—surveyed almost 2,600 VA primary-care practitioners from June 2010 through November 2010 healthcare
regarding EHR-based alerts. Almost 30% acknowledged missing notification of test results that led to care delays,
according to a research letter in the American Medical Association journal JAMA Internal Medicine (formerly the Archives of
Internal Medicine).
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Respondents reported receiving a median of 63 alerts a
day, which 86.9% perceived to be excessive. Also, 69.6%
said they received more alerts than they could manage. In
addition to volume, other factors related to the perception
and potential of missed test results included the usability
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2. of the EHR system and electronic handoff of a patient's
record to another provider.
The researchers warned that just reducing the number of
alerts without taking account of other factors in the “broader
primary-care practitioner experience” would probably not
be sufficient to improve outcomes.
“Nevertheless, our findings suggest that missed results in
EHRs might be related to information overload from alert
notifications, electronic handoffs in care and practitioner
perceptions of poor EHR usability,” the researchers
concluded. "Interventions to improve safety of test result
follow-up in EHRs must address these factors.”
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The study was funded in part by the VA National Center for
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Patient Safety and the National Institutes of Health.
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