Pharmacy informatics
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Contents |
[edit] Definition of Pharmacy Informatics
Pharmacy informatics, also referred to as pharmacoinformatics, is the application of computers to the storage, retrieval and analysis of drug and prescription information. Pharmacy informaticists work with pharmacy information management systems that help the pharmacist make excellent decisions about patient drug therapies with respect to, medical insurance records, drug interactions, as well as prescription and patient information.
Pharmacy informatics is the study of interactions between people, their work processes and engineered systems within health care with a focus on pharmaceutical care and improved patient safety.
Pharmacy informatics can be thought of as a sub-domain of the larger professional discipline of health informatics. Some definitions of pharmacy informatics reflect this relationship to health informatics. For example, the Health Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS) defines pharmacy informatics as, "the scientific field that focuses on medication-related data and knowledge within the continuum of healthcare systems - including its acquisition, storage, analysis, use and dissemination - in the delivery of optimal medication-related patient care and health outcomes"
[edit] Future of Pharmacy Informatics
Pharmacy informatics will likely continue to grow in its scope and importance for some time. When, in 1999, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) published the report To Err is Human, the pharmacy community was at once called out for allowing unsafe medication management practices to preponderate and called upon to dramatically improve the safety of medication use in the United States. The Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP, [1]), a leading patient safety organization, is well positioned to advance medication safety efforts. ISMP continues to focus on pharmacy informatics and patient information management as key areas of both promise and concern, promise that the application of new information technologies will improve patient safety and concern that the diffusion, adoption and best-practice use of medication management technologies is happening too slowly. Time will tell if pharmacy informatics, as an area of applied information sciences and as a sub-discipline of health informatics, will indeed positively transform medication use so that patients benefit from improved safety and efficacy with respect to the medications they require.
[edit] See also
- Clinical decision support system
- Diffusion of innovations
- Inherent safety
- Nursing informatics
- Patient safety
- Pharmacy
- Preventable medical error
- Unintended consequences
- Bar Code Medication Administration
[edit] External links
- American Medical Informatics Association Pharmacoinformatics Working Group
- American Society of Automation in Pharmacy
- ASHP Section on Pharmacy Informatics and Technology
- HIMSS Pharmacy Informatics
- Pharmacy Informatics Introduction
- Pharmacy Informatics Training
