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Joined in studio by Nancy Zimmerman, Chief Nursing Officer with medCPU. She joins me to discuss how clinical decision support (CDS) improves diagnosis!
Notes and discussion guide from our conversation with Nancy Zimmerman:
1. To lead us off, Nancy first provides definitions of both clinical decision support and clinical decision support systems.
2. A discussion around how advanced CDS is playing an ever growing important role in promoting patient safety and diagnostic accuracy.
3. Nancy also provides us a little history and background as to how we got to this place where deaths result from medical error.
4. Utilizing CDS alerts on a full clinical patient picture.
5. Further, how do CDS alerts ensure that ALL information is gathered enterprise wide?
6. How does CDS incorporate things such as long, free-text notes produced MONTHS ago into real-time need?
7. A fascinating conversation around CDS alerts and silent deterioration. Nancy shares some examples such as combating sepsis (a major problem resulting from medical error) and performing a lumbar puncture.
8. We close with a discussion around whether the implementation of CDS is a difficult one, and of its ease-of-use. Finally, we learn how a CDSS can adapt and evolve as users interact with the system!
About Nancy Zimmerman:
Nancy is a leader in the field of nursing technology, having cofounded VasTech in 2000, a company that developed and marketed healthcare workforce management software before being acquired by Lawson Software.
As Director of Implementation Services, she used her healthcare expertise to successfully guide organization-wide decisions on product development, best practice, change management, and implementation of the workforce management product suite in the US, Canada, and Ireland. The VasTech client base included Johns Hopkins, Cedars Sinai, Memorial Sloan Kettering, Barnes Jewish, Thomas Jefferson, Clarion Health Systems, and Kaiser Permanente.
Nancy also has extensive clinical experience, serving as a consultant to the school health board in Atlanta, Georgia where she created and established a clinical school health program. She has worked as a high risk labor and delivery nurse and certified perinatal educator at Northside Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia, and has consulted with a wide range of organizations to evaluate and establish best practice standards.
Nancy joined medCPU in 2009 and helps ensure the accuracy of the solution and affirming that prompts are delivered efficiently and effectively for the best user experience and greatest impact on improved patient care.
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He is a former marketing strategist, national political operative, and lobbyist.
Todd has published five books, writes a business + lifestyle column, is a distance runner, and lives in Chicago with his wife Stephanie + family.
