Diagnostic Errors and Health Informatics: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Paul Epner, CEO and Co-Founder, Society to Improve Diagnosis in Medicine.  Diagnostic Errors, i.e., failures to provide an accurate and timely explanation for a patient’s problem, are the most significant patient safety issue today, causing more morbidity and mortality than all other patient safety problems combined.  Informatics will certainly have a significant role in improving the situation, but today it is also a significant contributor to the problem.  In this session, case studies will be shared as we review what we know about diagnostic quality and safety, the structural and process barriers to high quality diagnosis created by electronic health records, and strategies for leveraging EHRs to mitigate diagnostic risks and improve outcomes.