TY - JOUR
T1 - Clinical Decision Support Tools for Microbiology Laboratory Testing
AU - Jackups, Ronald
PY - 2020/3/1
Y1 - 2020/3/1
N2 - Microbiology clinical laboratory testing has a vital impact on diagnostic and treatment decisions for patients with infectious diseases, but poor utilization can lead to diagnostic errors, overuse of antibiotics, and increased hospital stays for unnecessary treatment. Traditional efforts to improve test utilization, such as education and one-on-one engagement with clinicians, are not always effective at achieving widespread and long-lasting benefits. Clinical decision support (CDS), the use of computer and communication technology to improve clinical decision making, is one option to improve test utilization at an institutional level with minimal day-to-day effort. In this article, examples of CDS are introduced to demonstrate both the potential of CDS to improve microbiology test utilization and the challenges involved in its implementation and maintenance.
AB - Microbiology clinical laboratory testing has a vital impact on diagnostic and treatment decisions for patients with infectious diseases, but poor utilization can lead to diagnostic errors, overuse of antibiotics, and increased hospital stays for unnecessary treatment. Traditional efforts to improve test utilization, such as education and one-on-one engagement with clinicians, are not always effective at achieving widespread and long-lasting benefits. Clinical decision support (CDS), the use of computer and communication technology to improve clinical decision making, is one option to improve test utilization at an institutional level with minimal day-to-day effort. In this article, examples of CDS are introduced to demonstrate both the potential of CDS to improve microbiology test utilization and the challenges involved in its implementation and maintenance.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85079847356&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.clinmicnews.2020.02.001
DO - 10.1016/j.clinmicnews.2020.02.001
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85079847356
VL - 42
SP - 35
EP - 44
JO - Clinical Microbiology Newsletter
JF - Clinical Microbiology Newsletter
SN - 0196-4399
IS - 5
ER -