The Evidence Shows IOM Was Right on Health IT and Patient Safety

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[Commentary] The nation has seen widespread adoption of health IT as a result of the Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs. With that increase in adoption, there should be more and better evidence on the actual impact of health IT on safety. Health IT should raise the floor on patient safety, and the evidence shows that it has. To help answer questions about the role health IT plays in patient safety, we recently posted an Issue Brief titled “Recent Evidence that Health IT Improves Patient Safety.”

On balance, the report found health IT has clearly made care safer. These studies mean that health IT has almost certainly led to far fewer people being harmed than would have been without widespread health IT adoption. The Issue Brief reviews four systematic literature reviews that used a consistent methodology and finds consistent and significant net benefits on patient safety from the adoption of health IT. Health IT is not and never will be a “silver bullet” that reduces unsafe conditions, errors, and adverse events. To improve safety and quality, health IT is an important part of delivery system reform and redesigned systems of care. Health IT, when well designed and implemented, is a tool that can help health information flow in ways that allow for improvements in patient health and safety. Whatever the drawbacks to health IT systems, the evidence suggests that health IT has raised the floor on safety. The widespread adoption of health IT has been a clear benefit to patient safety. We need to continue to work on making health IT even better in a redesigned health system with patient safety and quality its first priority.

[Andrew Gettinger, MD is Chief Medical Information Officer and Acting Director of the Office of Clinical Quality and Safety. Kathy Kenyon, JUD is a Senior Policy Analyst]


The Evidence Shows IOM Was Right on Health IT and Patient Safety