A new survey found most chief medical information officers in U.S. hospitals believe medication management improvement efforts are positively impacting patient safety, but that there’s more work to be done.
The survey was conducted by the Association of Medical Directors of Information Systems and sponsored by DrFirst, a company that provides e-prescribing solutions. It included responses from 50 CMIOs.
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Eighty-two percent of respondents said medication management improvement initiatives have had a positive impact on adverse drug events.
But there are still a number of factors that compromise patient safety.
One such issue is price transparency and how it impacts medication adherence. Seventy-one percent of CMIOs noted they were concerned with the lack of an ability to inform patients how much a prescribed drug will cost.
Another big patient safety gap is related to the opioid epidemic. Forty-one percent of CMIO respondents indicated worries about providers’ ability to prevent opioid abuse. And 65 percent said there’s a need to coordinate the whole medication management process, from e-prescribing to access to PDMPs.
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Other areas putting patient safety at risk include workflow variation across departments (91 percent of CMIOs), a lack of process buy-in or process compliance (77 percent) and a lack of process ownership (73 percent).
Surveyed CMIOs had a suggestion for how to improve patients’ well-being as it relates to medication management. Ninety-five percent believe reducing order entry and data validation burdens for pharmacy and clinical staff will enhance patient safety.
G. Cameron Deemer, president of Rockville, Maryland-based DrFirst, also had a recommendation.
“By leveraging data and medication management technologies, including those that provide easy PDMP access and price transparency at the point of prescribing, care teams are better positioned to drive safer, more effective care — and increase medication adherence for patients across the country,” he said, according to a news release.
Photo: Stuart Ritchie, Getty Images
