Reaching 95%: decision support tools are the surest way to improve diagnosis now (5 October 2021)

Summary

Diagnostic errors are the number one patient safety concern in healthcare today, inflicting harm on hundreds of thousands of patients in the USA annually. The problem is complex and involves the difficulties inherent in diagnosis generally, the known weaknesses of human cognition and the myriad breakdown points in our healthcare systems.

In this BMJ Editorial, Mark Graber discusses the advantages of clinical decision support tools for diagnosis (CDS-Dx) and three promising trends regarding the uptake and potential use of CDS-Dx systems.

Further reading:

Co-development of OurDX - an online tool to facilitate patient and family engagement in the diagnostic process