CDS Systems, EBP and Clinical Guidelines

888 Words2 Pages

CDS Systems, EBP and Clinical Guidelines:
Similar to Global Positioning Systems (GPS) provide drivers with directions, detours, alternative routes, and alerts, Clinical Decision Support (CDS) systems provide health care professionals with guidance for important decisions associated with patient care. These systems have many capabilities including synthesizing patient information, suggesting diagnostic tests, providing alerts for life-threatening situations, recommending treatment options, and providing relevant evidence and best practices. Nonetheless, just as GPSs, CDS systems are not usually perfect as evident in the ongoing evolution of their design specifications and functionalities. Some of the major issues that are still evolving for CDS systems include alert fatigue and integration of evidence-based practice (EBP) resources and clinical guidelines. One of the major areas that can benefit from the adoption and integration of clinical decision support systems is community health nursing. These systems can be used together with evidence-based medicine to help improve the quality of health and patient care in community health nursing.
Integration of CDS Systems in Community Health Nursing:
Generally, the development and adoption of Clinical Decision Support (CDS) systems is based on the necessity and essence of technical standards in enhancing healthcare. However, the various health IT tools must comply with some data interchange standards in order to enhance access to clinical records, lessen clinical errors and risks to patient safety, and promote innovation in “individual-based” care (Hammond, Jaffe & Kush, 2009, p.44). The need for compliance with standards is fueled by their role in enabling aggregation of informa...

... middle of paper ...

...benefits of this type of clinical decision support system include easy access to information and patient records, provision of timely support throughout the care process, reduced costs, enhanced efficiency, and reduced patient inconvenience. However the disadvantages include potential difficulties in interpreting information, difficulties in handling the huge amount of nursing literature, and probability of additional demands to care process.
In conclusion, clinical decision support systems provide a mechanism for improving the quality of care services when integrated with evidence-based practice and clinical guidelines. These systems would particularly improve health care quality when combined with evidence-based medicine. This process may also include the use of databases and condition-specific clinical guidelines to improve their effectiveness and efficiency.

Open Document