Using PDAs during the internal medicine clerkship

In 2000, an Institute of Medicine Report stated that there are 99,000 deaths in hospitals each year due to medical errors. Many options have been tried to improve systems and practice patterns, but they have proven to be too cumbersome to be workable and were not accepted by physicians. We conducted a study of 19 third-year medical students (12 males, 7 females) at the West Virginia University School of Medicine, Charleston Division, during their eight-week clerkship in 2002 to determine whether providing them patient information at bedside with Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) would be valuable. In addition, we also wanted to see if the students would accept the use of these devices and better capture data on patient procedures. The Palm M 500 model was used in the study and every unit was preloaded with Epocrates, Epocrates ID, 5 Minute Clinical Consult, Harrison's and Patient Keeper Version 2.3. The medical students were given 15 minutes of instruction in the use and care of the PDAs, and they were required to input any procedures they performed or observed for patients into Patient Keeper 2.3. A pre-clerkship survey and a post clerkship survey with a five-point rating scale revealed the students had a very wide acceptance of the PDAs for the input and access of medical information. As these devices become cheaper, more powerful, more feature-packed, and as software in the PDA format becomes even more medically oriented, these devices will become much more common in hospitals. PDAs offer a valuable means of reducing medical errors and further modernizing medical record keeping.