title: Promoting generic medication prescribing by order interface redesign: small change, large impact.
abstract: Prescription drugs are a significant component of the ever increasing health care costs. We describe the effects on generic medication prescribing behavior achieved through redesign of the order entry interface of our institutions ambulatory electronic health record. The redesign involved custom programming that automatically substituted brand medications with their generic equivalents and only allowed continuation with the brand medication if the clinician made an extra mouse click selecting "dispense as written". We conducted a before-after retrospective study around the time of the redesign and witnessed a net 36.9% percentage increase in the number of generic medications prescribed.
authors.affiliation: Weill Medical College, Cornell University, New York, NY, USA. sam2032@med.cornell.edu
authors.forename: Sameer
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Malhotra
authors.forename: Jessica S
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Ancker
authors.forename: J Travis
authors.initials: JT
authors.lastname: Gossey
authors.forename: Curtis L
authors.initials: CL
authors.lastname: Cole
authors.forename: Rainu
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kaushal
authors.forename: Adam D
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: Cheriff
mesh_terms: D016568:Drugs, Generic; D055695:Electronic Prescribing; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000379:methods*; D050316:Medical Order Entry Systems; D008510:Medication Systems, Hospital; D014481:United States; D014584:User-Computer Interface
chemical_list: D016568:Drugs, Generic