Clinical decision-support tools are becoming increasingly available to the 60% of U.S. physicians who practice in smaller groups, according to the report Clinical Decision Support for the Independent Physician Practice.

Commissioned by California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF) and conducted by First Consulting Group (FCG), (NASDAQ: FCGI), the report highlights readily available tools that support clinical decision-making in the outpatient practice and tips on getting started in bringing these to the point of care. As illustrated in a number of case examples, an increasing number of early adopters are successfully implementing clinical decision-support tools that range from the simple to more complex. Their experiences help demonstrate what innovative physicians can do using technology available today.

"The technology complexity and cost barriers that have traditionally discouraged smaller practices from implementing clinical decision-support tools appear to be diminishing so that even smaller practices are able to integrate these tools into their clinical workflow," according to Thomas Lee, M.D., M.B.A., senior program officer at CHCF. "This is particularly important given the growing informational demands and time pressures that independent practitioners face today."

Case studies include a six-physician family practice in Waterloo, Iowa, that uses an electronic medical record (EMR) with decision-support features to better manage their diabetic patients; a residency clinic in Arkansas that uses automated clinical reference tools to access disease and pharmaceutical information in the exam room; and a New Jersey IPA using an electronic patient registry with 33 affiliated family practices to improve the care of asthmatic patients.

According to Gordon Moore, M.D., a solo family practitioner featured in the report, "My EMR and patient registry give me the ability to be much more proactive in managing my patients' health. It simply wouldn't be possible otherwise to do outreach when my patients need to be scheduled for foot or blood-pressure checks, for example. Practicing medicine this way is definitely the right thing to do, and I would never go back to paper as my major information tool."

Jane Metzger, research director at First Consulting Group and an author of the report, said, "The combination of Web technology and vendor solutions that supply clinical applications in bite-size pieces that are easier to implement has opened a lot of doors for smaller physician practices to jump into this space. Though use is not yet widespread, clinical decision support systems are now more affordable and do not require huge upfront technology investments."

Clinical Decision Support for the Independent Physician Practice can be found online through the link below.