Making the most of your electronic patient record system: Usability

Summary

The usability of an EPR is not a trivial issue. A poorly designed and configured system will have a big impact on everything from productivity to patient safety. Poor usability results in workarounds, including the creation of what is known as shadow IT. That might include spreadsheets, word documents and other background systems that have no governance and create all sorts of unquantified risks.

A design-led approach to understanding users' needs is a proven way to making your EPR as usable as possible. This is often undermined when digital transformation is funded by one-off capital injections from the centre which encourages teams to focus on purchasing capital items rather than on optimising their systems.

In this article NHS Providers discusses usability, the benefits of investing in learning and development, and shares a case study of optimising your EPR through user experience.