Chapter 1: Why embed clinical decision support into your EHR?
Clinical decision support (CDS) enables clinicians to answer more of these questions accurately. The published literature overwhelmingly shows the positive impact that CDS has on patient care and outcomes.
Given increased caseloads, regulatory burdens, and adoption of new technologies, clinicians are under more time constraints than ever. For this reason, it is critical that CDS is easily accessible to clinicians while they work. Given most clinician workflow is driven by the EHR, it makes sense to embed CDS within the EHR. Any barriers to CDS mean that clinicians will be less likely to use it at the point of care.
Given that the EHR is an integral component in patient treatment for most clinicians, the combination of the two resources that clinicians can and should use most — the EHR and CDS — is an intuitive, effective pairing.
In fact, embedding CDS into the EHR may be one of the few electronic initiatives that saves clinicians time and improves efficiency, as well as increases clinician satisfaction while improving clinical and economic outcomes.
Chapter 2: What are the benefits of integrating clinical decision support into my EHR?
UpToDate® and leading EHR vendors have already done the work to make embedding CDS easy for your organization. Here are the top five benefits that organizations typically see when they embed CDS into their EHR workflow:
- Improved quality of care
- Increased efficiency and productivity
- Access to unlimited CME credit
- Physician satisfaction
- Standardized care
Chapter 3: What are best practices and lessons learned in embedding CDS into the EHR?
Unlike many time-consuming EHR implementations, embedding CDS is a very straightforward process. Using a simple API, it can take as little as one to four hours to put in place. The following seven tips will provide you with a roadmap of items to consider when embedding CDS into your EHR:
- Location
- Anywhere access
- Visibility
- The fewer clicks, the better
- Training and communication
- Have a physician champion
- Involve your patients
Chapter 4: How do I embed clinical decision support into my EHR?
UpToDate interviewed customers who have embedded links to UpToDate in their EHR to learn the techniques that work best for them. Unlike many EHR integrations, or other healthcare IT projects that involve time-consuming integrations between systems, CDS implementation is a very straightforward process. Using a simple API, it can take as little as one to four hours to embed CDS into clinicians’ workflow.
