Decision Support Flashcards
7 cards from real AHIC practice questions. Tap to flip, then mark Knew It or Still Learning — missed cards come back until you master them.
Read the first 7 Decision Support flashcards as text
A hospital implements a sepsis early warning score that pages the rapid response team when the threshold is crossed. After six months, ICU nurses report the pager fires too frequently with false positives. The BEST next step is to:
Answer: Re-evaluate and recalibrate the score threshold using local patient data
Recalibrating the alert threshold using local performance data reduces false positives while preserving sensitivity for true sepsis cases.
In the context of CDS lifecycle management, what does 'sunset' mean?
Answer: Retiring and deactivating a CDS rule that is no longer clinically valid or relevant
Sunsetting refers to the formal retirement of a CDS rule when the underlying evidence changes or the rule is no longer appropriate for the clinical environment.
Which evaluation framework assesses CDS systems across the dimensions of structure, process, and outcomes?
Answer: Donabedian model
The Donabedian model evaluates healthcare quality using structure (resources), process (care delivery), and outcomes (patient results), applicable to CDS evaluation.
Which unintended consequence is most commonly reported after deploying a new CDS alert for venous thromboembolism (VTE) prophylaxis?
Answer: Alert fatigue leading to high override rates without clinical review
Frequent VTE prophylaxis alerts often contribute to alert fatigue, causing clinicians to override them without adequate review, undermining the alert's purpose.
A CDS rule library uses the FHIR PlanDefinition resource. What does this resource primarily describe?
Answer: A shareable, computable representation of a clinical protocol or decision support rule
FHIR PlanDefinition encodes shareable clinical knowledge such as protocols, order sets, and CDS rules in a computable format.
Which approach is MOST aligned with 'closing the loop' in CDS effectiveness monitoring?
Answer: Tracking whether recommended actions (e.g., VTE prophylaxis ordered) were completed after an alert fired
Closing the loop means verifying that the clinically recommended action was actually taken after the CDS alert fired, measuring true behavioral impact.
A clinical informaticist is asked to evaluate a new AI-based CDS tool for predicting 30-day readmission. Which validation step is MOST critical before clinical deployment?
Answer: Prospectively validate the model's performance on the local patient population
Prospective local validation confirms the model's predictive performance holds in the specific patient population and care environment where it will be deployed.