Study Finds Wired Hospitals Are Safer

Hospitals that have invested significantly in health information technology have lower mortality rates than other hospitals.
"There are three key differences in how hospitals apply and use information technology to improve care," said Alden Solovy, executive editor of Hospitals & Health Networks, the journal of the American Hospital Association. "The 'Most Wired' use a wider array of IT tools to address quality and safety, they have a significantly larger percentage of physicians who enter orders themselves and they conduct a larger percentage of clinical activities via information technology."
And they are safer environments for patients. According to Hospitals & Health Networks' annual "100 Most Wired" survey, the top wired hospitals have, on average, risk-adjusted mortality rates that are 7.2% lower than other hospitals.
The relationship between improved outcomes and information technology has been previously documented in both academic and practitioner research, but those studies usually dealt with specific projects and targeted safety improvements. According to H&HN, this is the first analysis showing that hospitals with broad use of information technology across a variety of projects also have better outcomes.
H&HN called the differences between "Most Wired" and "Least Wired" hospitals "staggering." The analysis does not establish an explicit causal relationship between IT and outcomes. But it points hospitals and health care organizations in a positive direction.
"The association is strongly suggestive, not causal, but it's an important piece of the research," said Carolyn Clancy, M.D., the director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, according to the article. MORE... or US Physicians: Technology and Trends