ONC officials share health IT safety efforts

The ONC’s Office of Clinical Quality and Safety is gearing up to build the foundation for a Health IT Safety Center, according to a Health IT Buzz blog post by the office’s director, Amy Helwig, MD, MS and Chief Nursing Officer Judy Murphy, RN.

The safety center will bring together both private and public stakeholders to provide education on health IT safety, review studies on the safety benefits of health IT, and identify and promote interventions to optimize the safe implementation and use of health IT. “We are excited about this process and encourage you to follow along as we build this new public-private partnership and look for ways to ensure that health IT is used safely,” the ONC officials wrote.

The blog also recounted ONC’s efforts this year so far to learn, lead and improve upon health IT safety, as set forth in the July 2013 Health IT Safety and Surveillance Plan. This year, the office has been implementing its health IT safety program, and has established its Office of Clinical Quality and Safety.

The officials wrote that they have learned more about EHRs’ positive impact on quality and safety, and have a better understanding of the types of safety events related to health IT. Rising participation in Meaningful Use means greater overall safety, they said, citing studies linking Meaningful Use functionalities with clinically significant benefits, including safety.

“Three times as many physicians reported that their EHR prevented a potential medication error than caused one,” they wrote, citing data from the 2013 National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey of Physician Workflow.

Moreover, they noted an Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality-funded study that found that Florida hospitals which adopted all five core measures of Meaningful Use for medication management in 2010 had the lowest rate of adverse drug events of all hospitals in the state.

“Even with this progress on EHR adoption and the improvements in quality and safety, we realize that patient safety events related to health IT can still occur,” the officials said. It noted the publication of the Safety Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience (SAFER) Guides, which promote 158 recommended practices to prevent mistakes caused by EHR technology itself.

The blog also noted the formation of a new Health It Policy Committee workgroup specifically focused on Implementation, Usability and Safety.

Read the full post here.