The impact of health information management professionals on patient safety: A systematic review

Background: The importance of high-quality health information for patient safety has been established in the literature, yet the impact of the professionals who are the custodians of health information is absent. Objectives: This article presents the results of a systematic literature review examining the impact of the Health Information Management (HIM) profession on patient safety. Methods: A PRISMA approach was adopted for the review of selected databases and specific journals. Titles identified as relating to HIM and patient quality were screened using Covidence ® by title and abstract, followed by full text. The quality of selected articles was assessed and thematically analysed. Results: Analysis of the 8 included articles found that the key themes from the non-empirical research were data quality, information governance, corporate governance, skills and knowledge required for HIM professionals. Discussion: Most publications focussed on HIM professional involvement in maintaining standards for data quality and health records, but not the professional qualifications themselves. Conclusions: There are links between patient safety and health records, and between health records and HIM professional work. More empirical research is needed to demonstrate how qualified HIM professionals contribute to patient safety.