Although the automated documentation system was more expensive than the current system, it also provided qualitative benefits that were not considered in the cost-effectiveness analysis.

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The body of physician order entry (POE) implementations literature uses statistical evaluation methods to demonstrate changes in specified variables after POE implementation. To understand and manage the holistic impact of POE on the health care institution, a methodology that utilizes feedback to guide the POE implementation towards the satisfaction of stakeholder objectives is presented. Stakeholders jointly define quantitative and qualitative metrics for their objectives, establish target value vectors for the metrics that represent acceptable implementation outcomes and specify evaluation milestones. These are used to compare pre- and post-POE implementation clinical performance, enabling a socio-technical feedback-improvement cycle. A case study is provided to illustrate how the methodology is being used at Sunnybrook and Women's College Health Science Centre in Toronto, Canada.

Background: Hospitals need to accurately manage mobile devices (e.g., intravenous pumps) associated to their patients and health providers to ensure patient safety. Some hospitals have already invested substantially in real-time location system (RTLS) technology, a specific type of Internet of Things (IoT) application for indoor positioning, to manage mobile clinical devices. Objective: This paper investigates the reuse of RTLS systems to monitor patients and their assigned devices and to manage their connectivity automatically, in real time. Method: A system called Real-time Patient-Device Association and Disassociation (RPDAD) is designed, implemented, and tested in a hospital room and in a university laboratory. Results: RPDAD helps manage patient-device associations through a tablet application, with accurate suggestions for closest devices and automated detection of unexpected disassociations, resulting in real-time alerts. Conclusion: RPDAD offers a usable means of managing associations that does not depend on bar-coding technologies. It also helps amortize investments in RTLS.

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