Abstract
Objectives
The diagnostic process is a vital component of safe and effective emergency department (ED) care. There are no standardized methods for identifying or reliably monitoring diagnostic errors in the ED, impeding efforts to enhance diagnostic safety. We sought to identify trigger concepts to screen ED records for diagnostic errors and describe how they can be used as a measurement strategy to identify and reduce preventable diagnostic harm.
Methods
We conducted a literature review and surveyed ED directors to compile a list of potential electronic health record (EHR) trigger (e-triggers) and non-EHR based concepts. We convened a multidisciplinary expert panel to build consensus on trigger concepts to identify and reduce preventable diagnostic harm in the ED.
Results
Six e-trigger and five non-EHR based concepts were selected by the expert panel. E-trigger concepts included: unscheduled ED return to ED resulting in hospital admission, death following ED visit, care escalation, high-risk conditions based on symptom-disease dyads, return visits with new diagnostic/therapeutic interventions, and change of treating service after admission. Non-EHR based signals included: cases from mortality/morbidity conferences, risk management/safety office referrals, ED medical director case referrals, patient complaints, and radiology/laboratory misreads and callbacks. The panel suggested further refinements to aid future research in defining diagnostic error epidemiology in ED settings.
Conclusions
We identified a set of e-trigger concepts and non-EHR based signals that could be developed further to screen ED visits for diagnostic safety events. With additional evaluation, trigger-based methods can be used as tools to monitor and improve ED diagnostic performance.
Funding source: Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
Award Identifier / Grant number: R01HS024953
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank Elizabeth Duffy for her contributions to the project and this work.
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Research funding: This work was supported by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality [grant number R01HS024953]. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and Department of Veterans Affairs. Dr. Singh is funded in part by the Houston Veterans Administration (VA) Health Services Research and Development (HSR&D) Center for Innovations in Quality, Effectiveness, and Safety (CIN13-413), the VA HSR&D Service (CRE17-127 and the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers USA 14–274), the VA National Center for Patient Safety, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (R01HS27363), the CanTest Research Collaborative funded by a Cancer Research UK Population Research Catalyst award (C8640/A23385) and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.
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Author contributions: PM and HS conceived the study, designed the consensus meeting, and obtained research funding. PM identified and convened the expert panel and organized consensus meeting; CM, PM, and HS led the consensus discussion; all authors (excluding SJP) participated in consensus meeting. PM and CWP drafted the manuscript, and all authors contributed substantially to its revision. PM takes responsibility for the paper as a whole. All authors have accepted responsibility for the entire content of this manuscript and approved its submission.
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Competing interests: Authors state no conflict of interest.
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Ethical approval: This project was determined to be exempt from ethics review by the Institutional Review Board.
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Meeting: Results of this research were presented as a poster at the Diagnostic Error in Medicine Conference in New Orleans, LA, on November 5, 2018.
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Supplementary Material
The online version of this article offers supplementary material (https://doi.org/10.1515/dx-2020-0122).
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