Glossary, documentation
What is clinical decision support?
Clinical decision support is any tool that gives a clinician relevant knowledge or patient information at the point of a decision, such as guideline recommendations, alerts, reminders or summaries of the record. It informs the clinician's judgement, and the clinician remains responsible for the decision.
Updated . Defined by the wai team for clinics, groups and health systems.
Also called CDS, clinical decision support system or CDSS.
Why Clinical decision support matters to a clinic
Guidance changes faster than any clinician can track. Support that brings the relevant guideline or paper into the consultation, with its source, narrows the gap between what is known and what is done.
The test of good decision support is whether the clinician can check it. An answer that cites the guideline it rests on can be read and challenged, and an uncited answer cannot.
For a clinic, the gain shows up as consistency. Clinicians who see the same guidance at the same point make decisions that are easier to audit and to defend.
Questions
Does decision support make the decision?
No. It gives the clinician knowledge and patient information at the right moment, and the clinician decides and signs.
Why do citations matter in clinical decision support?
A cited answer can be checked against its source before it is used. wai cites the guidance or paper each answer rests on. See the scribe.
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