College of Nursing to Study Effect of Community Hospital Computerized
Order-Entry Systems on Adverse Drug Events
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Agency for Healthcare Quality & Research (AHRQ) awarded a $1.3 million grant for the three-year study. Rita Snyder-Halpern, PhD, RN, CNAA, BC, UA associate professor of nursing and health care informatics specialist, is the principal investigator; co-investigators are Willa Fields, DNSc, RN, Sharp HealthCare vice president for Patient Care Information Systems, and Al Rizos, PharmD, Sharp HealthCare System senior clinical pharmacy Specialist and medication safety expert.
AHRQ statistics indicate that more than 770,000 people are injured or die in hospitals each year from ADEs. Patients who experience ADEs are hospitalized an average of eight to 12 days longer than patients who do not suffer ADEs, resulting in an estimated annual cost between $1.56 and $5.6 billion. Research findings indicate 78 percent of errors leading to ADEs are due to inadequate information management systems, such as computerized provider order-entry (CPOE) systems _ and that these systems significantly can improve medication safety. Most research on the impact of CPOE systems, however, has been done in academic teaching hospitals. No research has been done in non-teaching community hospitals to determine what practices lead to successful CPOE system implementation, and the impact that these systems have on ADE outcomes. This is a significant deficit because the majority of hospitals in the United States are non-teaching community hospitals.
Significantly, this three-year study is the first of its kind in non-teaching community hospitals, and will coincide with implementation of a commercial CPOE system in three Sharp HealthCare community hospitals. Factors commonly associated with CPOE system implementation and the impact of the CPOE system on ADE outcomes will be studied. The study provides an invaluable opportunity to learn more about CPOE system implementation processes and impacts in community hospitals. It also will provide important information about "unique-versus-common" responses to the same CPOE system across three different hospitals within the same health care system.
Important information also will be gained about ADE detection and investigational procedures that potentially could be generalized to other community hospitals. This information will be vital to supporting efforts by community hospitals to establish safer medication practice environments.
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