Using the Electronic Health Record to Facilitate Drug Allergy Delabeling

TL;DR

This paper reviews how electronic health records can be used to help remove incorrect drug allergy labels in patients.

Contribution

The paper provides a structured overview of EHR tools used in allergy delabeling and offers recommendations for implementing these workflows.

Findings

EHR tools can be organized around six steps of the allergy delabeling workflow.

Standardized EHR tools improve delabeling success and stakeholder support.

Collaboration with EHR vendors can enhance allergy documentation and tool availability.

Abstract

There is a growing number of allergy delabeling programs across diverse clinical specialties and care settings. The electronic health record (EHR) can be leveraged to facilitate allergy delabeling. The purpose of this review is to describe EHR tools that have been used in allergy delabeling programs. We also provide recommendations for organizations considering EHR-based allergy delabeling workflows that incorporate clinical informatics best practices.

Recent literature describes several EHR tools used in delabeling. These tools can be organized around the steps of the allergy delabeling workflow: 1. Identify eligible patients, 2. Risk stratify, 3. Evaluation and testing, 4. Documentation of outcome, 5. Delabeling, and 6. Allergy label reconciliation.

Standardized EHR tools across the allergy delabeling workflow can lead to successful delabeling and support of diverse stakeholders. Partnering with EHR vendors presents an opportunity to make these tools readily available and improve allergy documentation.

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