Using the Electronic Health Record to Improve Patient Safety, David Bates MD, MSc, Professor of Medicine - Harvard Medical School

Dr. Bates is an internationally recognized expert on clinical decision support and medical errors. He is the Center Director on one of three national Centers of Excellence in Patient Safety and Research supported by NIH focusing on improving medication safety across the continuum of care and patient groups. Dr. Bates is the Chief of the Division of General Medicine at the Brigham and Women's Hospital. He is also the Medical Director of Clinical and Quality Analysis, IS and is on the Executive Committee of the Center of Information Technology Leadership at Partners HealthCare System, Inc. He is a Professor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School and has a Joint Appointment at the Harvard School of Public Health in the Department of Health Policy and Management. He is a Fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics.

Dr. Bates will discuss the ways that the electronic health record can be used to improve safety. He will review some of the evidence demonstrating that safety could be better both inside and outside the hospital. He will then discuss the impact of specific strategies for improving safety, and discuss what some of the

major opportunities may be for improving safety in the future using information technology.