Use of Digital Clinical Decision Support System Increases Adherence to Provision of Evidence-Based Interventions for...

Clinical decision support (CDS) tools have been demonstrated to improve patient care and outcomes yet remain under-utilized in many clinical domains, including en route care.

This study evaluated whether a decision-tree CDS tool integrated within the government-created Battlefield Assisted Trauma Distributed Observation Kit (BATDOK; AFRL) clinical care software improves adherence to Joint Trauma System (JTS) guidelines for severe traumatic brain injury (TBI).

In a randomized crossover simulation of military clinicians (N = 24), paired participants managed a patient with elevated intracranial pressure (ICP) using either usual care (UC) or BATDOK with TBI CDS in a simulated fixed-wing air transport mission. Outcomes included completion of critical actions by simulation conclusion, time to completion of critical actions, adherence to tiered interventions as outlined in JTS Clinical Practice Guideline (CPG), and user evaluations of the CDS tool using the validated instrument, System Usability Scale (SUS).

There were no significant differences in the primary outcome, percentage of critical items completed. Teams completed a median 83.3% of the critical items in the UC scenario, compared to 91.7% in the CDS scenario (P = 0.58; median difference 4.2%, 95% CI of the difference -8.1% to 16.4%). The mean SUS score for the CDS platform was 77.6 (SD = 16.0), which is associated with a "good" usability rating. Most participants rated the CDS platform favorably on every item of the SUS.

The BATDOK with TBI CDS did not statistically increase completion of critical tasks in this initial evaluation of usability. However, these data suggest that BATDOK enhanced with CDS improved tiered guideline-concordant sequencing of ICP interventions outlined by the JTS CPG and was favorably rated by users, suggesting feasibility for operational integration.