Health IT Analytics January, 2018
Patient matching is a critical safety concern. How can providers boost their data integrity to improve their accurate identification rates?
Patient matching errors are an insidious but all-too-common threat to patient safety in the healthcare setting. While providers have generally embraced the idea that a patient’s electronic record should follow her from the moment she steps into the office until the last time she has contact with a clinician, an individual’s journey along the care continuum often starts with a data integrity misstep.
Typos, missing information, workarounds, and data entry quirks can result in duplicated or inappropriately merged records that pose significant problems for clinicians who rely on accurate and complete data for making informed decisions about care.
In the...