Electronic prescribing improves medication safety in community-based office practices. | AHRQ Patient Safety Network

Electronic prescribing improves medication safety in community-based office practices. | AHRQ Patient Safety Network

• Study
 
• Published February 2010

Electronic prescribing improves medication safety in community-based office practices.

Kaushal R, Kern LM, Barrón Y, Quaresimo J, Abramson EL. J Gen Intern Med. 2010;25:530-536.

Few ambulatory practices use electronic health records (EHRs) in any form, and even those that do generally do not utilize advanced functions such as computerized provider order entry(CPOE). Cost and a lack of high-quality efficacy data are frequently cited as barriers to EHR and CPOE adoption. This controlled trial compared prescribing error rates in 15 ambulatory practices that adopted a commercial e-prescribing system to those of 15 practices that continued using standard paper prescriptions, and found a striking reduction in prescribing errors in the CPOE group. Such safety data may help make the business case for adopting CPOE in the ambulatory setting. A Patient Safety Primer discusses medication errors and other common safety problems in ambulatory care.

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