Computer order entry systems reduce preventable adverse drug events

Despite a national mandate to implement electronic health records and computer order entry systems (CPOE) by 2014, only about 30 percent of hospitals in the US have done so. New research from Brigham and Women's Hospital examined the impact of CPOE in five community hospitals in Massachusetts and found that these systems are effective at reducing drug-related injury and harm. Previous studies evaluating CPOE systems have been performed in academic settings with systems that have been developed internally. While these studies have demonstrated significant advantages of the systems, there has been no research into the effectiveness of vendor CPOE systems in a community hospital setting. The researchers observed a 34 percent drop in reduction in preventable adverse drug events with the new systems.