HIE Reduces Redundant Testing
By Katie Wike, contributing writer
HIEs used in emergency departments have proved to reduce the number of duplicate tests and identify drug-seeking behavior in patients
According to a new study published in Applied Clinical Informatics, use of a health information exchange in emergency departments not only reduced duplicate and unnecessary tests, but also helped to identify drug-seeking behavior in patients. Care Everywhere, the HIE tool, was integrated into Minnesota-based Allina Health's electronic health record system and used by four emergency departments. “Emergency departments (EDs) routinely struggle with gaps in information when providing patient care. A point to point health information exchange (HIE) model has the potential to effectively fill those gaps,” explain researchers.
iHealth Beat reports that in these four emergency rooms, the tool was used in only 1.46 percent of ER visits. Despite this small amount of use, “A review of ED provider notes over that time period (6 months) revealed CE use resulted in 560 duplicate diagnostic procedures being avoided and 28 cases of drug seeking behavior identified,” says the report.
Physicians who used the tool also reported it provided other valuable material, including discharge summaries, ECG interpretations, and medication lists. “Physicians thought the information received via CE was of value to patient care, particularly laboratory results, imaging, medication lists, discharge summaries and ECG interpretations. They feel the greatest impact of HIE is the avoidance of duplicative diagnostic testing and the identification of drug-seeking behavior. Nursing and ancillary staff expressed somewhat less enthusiasm but still felt HIE positively impacted patient care.
“Our study provides insight into the perceived value of HIE from the point of view of our ED physicians and staff. It also demonstrates that a point-to-point HIE tool such as Epic System’s Care Everywhere has the potential to generate greater efficiencies within the ED and impact to patient care through elimination of duplicative diagnostic imaging or testing and resource utilization associated with those procedures,” concluded researchers.