Amiodarone Pharmacovigilance Through an Intelligent Electronic Health Record Application

WMJ. 2023 Sep;122(4):280-283.

Abstract

Background: Amiodarone is the most effective and commonly used antiarrhythmic medication. Given its risk of toxicity, routine monitoring is recommended but is challenging to ensure in clinical practice.

Methods: We created an intelligent application, built within our electronic health record, that identified every living patient with an active outpatient prescription by a clinician in our health system. The application was designed to identify patients with lapses in recommended monitoring and facilitate scheduling of overdue testing.

Results: The percentage of patients with overdue monitoring tests decreased with use of the application, with greatest improvement in pulmonary function testing.

Discussion: Implementing a program to monitor and mitigate adverse reactions to amiodarone by using programable features of an electronic health record is feasible.

MeSH terms

  • Amiodarone* / adverse effects
  • Anti-Arrhythmia Agents / adverse effects
  • Drug Monitoring
  • Electronic Health Records
  • Humans
  • Pharmacovigilance
  • Retrospective Studies

Substances

  • Amiodarone
  • Anti-Arrhythmia Agents