Clinical Decision Support and the Electronic Health Record-Applications for Physiatry

Clinical decision support (CDS) is a process that provides information to assist the user in decision making for evaluation and treatment. Although many think only of rules and alerts, CDS is much more than that. Order sets, clinical documents, information fields, and medication sentences are just a few other CDS tools to be considered. CDS has been shown to improve care. Forming the third point of the triangle, CDS, along with process redesign and workflow considerations, improves care and helps create successful outcomes. Failure to address all 3 of these elements creates a less-than-perfect and potentially dangerous result. Examples of the application of CDS in the field of physical medicine and rehabilitation remain limited. This field has a huge opportunity to use CDS to enhance patient care, and is an open area for CDS development and research.