Using Personal Digital Assistants to Access Drug Information
Using Personal Digital Assistants to Access Drug Information
The use of personal digital assistants (PDAs) to access drug information in a health system is described.
Given the widespread use of PDAs at an 872-bed university health system, an opportunity existed to provide current drug information to physicians via these devices. As part of the health system's intranet, extensive online content had been made available through a browser; extension to PDAs was a natural next step. There were two primary requirements: the ability to synchronize information with the database server when a PDA was used and the development of content and applications by using existing staff. Mobile enterprise software was chosen that supports multiple PDA platforms, is easy to use, and does not require programming skills. The software works through customized "channels," or collections of information from a content provider. The customized channel service works over the Internet. Two channels of content were created, an ambulatory care channel and an inpatient care channel. The ambulatory care channel contains a list of preferred ambulatory care agents, poison control information, the locations of outpatient pharmacies, drug information, and safety tips for prescribing. The inpatient channel contains the inpatient formulary, current news and events, information on currrent drug shortages and recalls, pharmacy contact information, and medication safety tips. When a user synchronizes his or her PDA, the software contacts the department's intranet servers and processes the request. The data are compressed and downloaded to the user's PDA.
A university health system successfully used PDAs to access drug and other information.
Hospitals and health systems have used formularies for many years in an effort to improve the quality of prescribing, ensure patient safety, and reduce costs. According to the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists, it is the responsibility of the pharmacy and therapeutics (P&T) committee to disseminate information on its actions, including formulary revisions, to all organizational health care staff. A key challenge with formulary and other drug information has been the timely dissemination of this information.
There is a general belief that the usefulness of drug information and compliance with formulary systems are enhanced if this information is available at the time of prescribing. Traditionally, drug information has been available on a convenient card or booklet that fits into the clinician's pocket. While drug information in this form has the advantage of being easily accessible at the time of prescribing, disadvantages include the difficulty of updating the information and the cost of producing pocket manuals. Therefore, some health systems have put their drug information online. While such computerized information is generally less expensive to manage and can be continually updated, the clinician must go to a computer terminal to access the information (and hope that the system is not "down"). At some sites, computer access may not be a substantial barrier. However, in many settings, access is limited, and many functions continue to be paper based.
Personal digital assistants (PDAs) are increasingly used by physicians, pharmacists, and nurses to access drug information at the point of care. The PDA drug information program ePocrates is said to be used by over 340,000 health care practitioners. If hospital-specific drug information and the formulary could be made available to clinicians on their PDAs, then the goals of an ideal pocket resource (convenience, updated information, and inexpensive maintenance) could be met at the point of care.
We describe how PDAs are used to access drug information in a large health system.
The use of personal digital assistants (PDAs) to access drug information in a health system is described.
Given the widespread use of PDAs at an 872-bed university health system, an opportunity existed to provide current drug information to physicians via these devices. As part of the health system's intranet, extensive online content had been made available through a browser; extension to PDAs was a natural next step. There were two primary requirements: the ability to synchronize information with the database server when a PDA was used and the development of content and applications by using existing staff. Mobile enterprise software was chosen that supports multiple PDA platforms, is easy to use, and does not require programming skills. The software works through customized "channels," or collections of information from a content provider. The customized channel service works over the Internet. Two channels of content were created, an ambulatory care channel and an inpatient care channel. The ambulatory care channel contains a list of preferred ambulatory care agents, poison control information, the locations of outpatient pharmacies, drug information, and safety tips for prescribing. The inpatient channel contains the inpatient formulary, current news and events, information on currrent drug shortages and recalls, pharmacy contact information, and medication safety tips. When a user synchronizes his or her PDA, the software contacts the department's intranet servers and processes the request. The data are compressed and downloaded to the user's PDA.
A university health system successfully used PDAs to access drug and other information.
Hospitals and health systems have used formularies for many years in an effort to improve the quality of prescribing, ensure patient safety, and reduce costs. According to the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists, it is the responsibility of the pharmacy and therapeutics (P&T) committee to disseminate information on its actions, including formulary revisions, to all organizational health care staff. A key challenge with formulary and other drug information has been the timely dissemination of this information.
There is a general belief that the usefulness of drug information and compliance with formulary systems are enhanced if this information is available at the time of prescribing. Traditionally, drug information has been available on a convenient card or booklet that fits into the clinician's pocket. While drug information in this form has the advantage of being easily accessible at the time of prescribing, disadvantages include the difficulty of updating the information and the cost of producing pocket manuals. Therefore, some health systems have put their drug information online. While such computerized information is generally less expensive to manage and can be continually updated, the clinician must go to a computer terminal to access the information (and hope that the system is not "down"). At some sites, computer access may not be a substantial barrier. However, in many settings, access is limited, and many functions continue to be paper based.
Personal digital assistants (PDAs) are increasingly used by physicians, pharmacists, and nurses to access drug information at the point of care. The PDA drug information program ePocrates is said to be used by over 340,000 health care practitioners. If hospital-specific drug information and the formulary could be made available to clinicians on their PDAs, then the goals of an ideal pocket resource (convenience, updated information, and inexpensive maintenance) could be met at the point of care.
We describe how PDAs are used to access drug information in a large health system.
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