While electronic health records (EHRs) have been in existence since the late 1960s, it wasn’t until almost 30 years later that the Institute of Medicine (IOM) concluded that healthcare would be safer with computerized physician order entry, estimating that 100,000 Americans die each year from preventable adverse events.
Now in 2015, most have heard the frightening number of deaths per year due to medical errors—400,000—or more than 1,000 lost lives in the U.S. every day. Preventable medical errors cause the third most deaths in the U.S., right after heart disease and cancer. With many organizations either upgrading old systems or making the decision on their first EHR, it is critical that patient safety is the ultimate goal.
