Prevalence and Causes of Diagnostic Errors in Hospitalized Patients Under Investigation for COVID-19.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic required clinicians to care for a disease with evolving characteristics while also adhering to care changes (e.g., physical distancing practices) that might lead to diagnostic errors (DEs).

Use, Perceived Usability, and Barriers to Implementation of a Patient Safety Dashboard Integrated within a Vendor EHR.

Background: Preventable adverse events continue to be a threat to hospitalized patients. Clinical decision support in the form of dashboards may improve compliance with evidence-based safety practices. However, limited research describes providers' experiences with dashboards integrated into vendor electronic health record (EHR) systems.

The Impact of Automated Notification on Follow-up of Actionable Tests Pending at Discharge: a Cluster-Randomized Controlled Trial.

Background: Follow-up of tests pending at discharge (TPADs) is poor. We previously demonstrated a twofold increase in awareness of any TPAD by attendings and primary care physicians (PCPs) using an automated email intervention OBJECTIVE: To determine whether automated notification improves documented follow-up for actionable TPADs DESIGN: Cluster-randomized controlled trial SUBJECTS: Attendings and PCPs caring for adult patients discharged from general medicine and cardiology services with at least one actionable TPAD between June 2011 and May 2012 INTERVENTION: An automated system that notifies discharging attendings and network PCPs of finalized TPADs by email MAIN MEASURES: The primary outcome was the proportion of actionable TPADs with documented action determined by independent physician review of the electronic health record (EHR). Secondary outcomes included documented acknowledgment, 30-day readmissions, and adjusted median days to documented follow-up.

User-Centered Collaborative Design and Development of an Inpatient Safety Dashboard.

Patient safety remains a key concern in hospital care. This article summarizes the iterative participatory development, features, functions, and preliminary evaluation of a patient safety dashboard for interdisciplinary rounding teams on inpatient medical services. This electronic health record (EHR)-embedded dashboard collects real-time data covering 13 safety domains through web services and applies logic to generate stratified alerts with an interactive check-box function.

Brain MRS glutamine as a biomarker to guide therapy of hyperammonemic coma.

Acute idiopathic hyperammonemia in an adult patient is a life-threatening condition often resulting in a rapid progression to irreversible cerebral edema and death. While ammonia-scavenging therapies lower blood ammonia levels, in comparison, clearance of waste nitrogen from the brain may be delayed. Therefore, we used magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) to monitor cerebral glutamine levels, the major reservoir of ammonia, in a gastric bypass patient with hyperammonemic coma undergoing therapy with N-carbamoyl glutamate and the ammonia-scavenging agents, sodium phenylacetate and sodium benzoate.

Effect of Evidence-based Clinical Decision Support on the Use and Yield of CT Pulmonary Angiographic Imaging in Hospitalized Patients.

Purpose: To determine the effect of clinical decision support (CDS) on the use and yield of inpatient computed tomographic (CT) pulmonary angiography for acute pulmonary embolism (PE).

Materials And Methods: This HIPAA-compliant, institutional review board-approved study with waiver of informed consent included all adults admitted to a 793-bed teaching hospital from April 1, 2007, to June 30, 2012. The CDS intervention, implemented after a baseline observation period, informed providers who placed an order for CT pulmonary angiographic imaging about the pretest probability of the study based on a validated decision rule.

Evaluating hematuria: impact of guideline adherence on urologic cancer diagnosis.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to assess physician adherence to 2001 American Urological Association (AUA) guidelines for evaluating patients with asymptomatic hematuria and its impact on the diagnosis of urologic cancer.

Methods: In this institutional review board-approved retrospective study of patients with asymptomatic hematuria evaluated in a large academic health center in 2004 (allowing for long-term follow-up), we randomly selected 100 of 1771 patients with asymptomatic hematuria (52 men; mean age 54 years; 58 microscopic, 39 macroscopic, three unknown-type hematuria; median follow-up 89 months, interquartile range 33-97 months). Multivariate logistic regression assessed effects of age, sex, hematuria type, and physician specialty on guideline adherence, the primary outcome.

Impact of IT-enabled intervention on MRI use for back pain.

Background: The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of a multifaceted, clinical decision support (CDS)-enabled intervention on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) use in adult primary care patients with low back pain.

Methods: After a baseline observation period, we implemented a CDS targeting lumbar-spine MRI use in primary care patients with low back pain through our computerized physician order entry, as well as 2 accountability tools: mandatory peer-to-peer consultation when test utility was uncertain and quarterly practice pattern variation reports to providers. Our primary outcome measure was rate of lumbar-spine MRI use.

Critical finding capture in the impression section of radiology reports.

Introduction: Radiology reports communicate imaging findings to ordering physicians. The substantial information in these reports often causes physicians to focus on the summarized "impression" section. This study evaluated how often a critical finding is documented in the report's "impression" section and describes how an automated application can improve documentation.