As electronic health records have proliferated, hospitals and health systems are increasingly using the information in electronic healthcare-associated infection surveillance systems.
Three trends have emerged surrounding the formation of these systems and their use of available data, according to a study in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association.
- Surveillance systems are pulling data from an increasing number of sources, including more administrative, clinical and laboratory-based data.
- Macrobiotic data remains the most important in tracking HAIs, but care facilities are beginning to use more biochemical and pharmacy data as well.
- There has been limited use of some clinical information, such as physician narratives.
The trends were found following a literature review from 26 published studies on HAI surveillance systems over the past 10 years.
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