Developing a knowledge management system to support intermediaries in health care decision making

The importance of decision support in health care is widely acknowledged. There is a range of decision support systems (DSS) introduced and used to support clinical decision-making. However, less attention has been paid to supporting evidence-based practice. These kinds of decision situations require identification and integration of the best available evidence for effective care with decision support of the health care practitioners. Up to this point, most DSS have been computer reminders, which integrate clinical guidelines and protocols. These are excellent summaries of good quality evidence, making recommendations for practice, but are currently limited in scope and topic coverage, due to the high cost and amount of time involved in developing them. Knowledge management within the context of evidence based health care has yet to be defined. This paper addresses the issue of how knowledge management can facilitate decision support within an organisation that has a range of intermediaries answering evidence-based questions on behalf of decision-makers. Decision support within this context is based on communicating right knowledge to the right user.