ICT for patient safety: Towards a European research roadmap

Abstract

This paper analyses key issues towards a research roadmap for eHealth-supported patient safety. The raison d'etre for research in this area is the high number of adverse patient events and deaths that could be avoided if better safety and risk management mechanisms were in place. The benefits that ICT applications can bring for increased patient safety are briefly reviewed, complemented by an analysis of key ICT tools in this domain. The paper outlines the impact of decision support tools, CPOE, as well as incident reporting systems. Some key research trends and foci like data mining, ontologies, modelling and simulation, virtual clinical trials, preparedness for large-scale events are touched upon. Finally, the synthesis points to the fact that only a multilevel analysis of ICT in patient safety will be able to address this complex issue adequately. The eHealth for Safety study will give insights into the structure of such an analysis in its lifetime and arrive at a vision and roadmap for more detailed research on increasing patient safety through ICT. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2006.