title: Computerized reminders to physicians in the emergency department: a web-based system to report late-arriving abnormal laboratory results.
abstract: Inadequate follow-up for abnormal laboratory results is a frequent cause of medical errors, especially for those that arrive after the patient is discharged in an Emergency Department (ED) setting. We have developed and implemented a computerized reminder system called the Automated Late-Arriving Results Monitoring System (ALARMS) for the Emergency Department at Children's Hospital, Boston. ALARMS scans the hospital's laboratory and ED registration databases to generate an electronic daily log of all late-arriving abnormal results for ED patients, which can be obtained by authorized physicians through a web-based user interface inside the hospital's intranet. We believe, by using this automated data-driven rule-based reminder system, we can minimize the risk of errors resulting from late-arriving laboratory data without requiring substantial additional efforts from clinicians.
authors.affiliation: Informatics Program, Children's Hospital Boston and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Zhaohui
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Cai
authors.forename: Isaac
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Kohane
authors.forename: Gary R
authors.initials: GR
authors.lastname: Fleisher
authors.forename: David S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Greenes
mesh_terms: D001900:Boston; D002984:Clinical Laboratory Information Systems; D019411:Clinical Laboratory Techniques; D003195:Computer Communication Networks; D003199:Computer Systems; D019992:Databases as Topic; D004636:Emergency Service, Hospital; D006776:Hospitals, Pediatric; D006801:Humans; D016347:Medical Records Systems, Computerized; D017010:Reminder Systems