Comprehensive Summary
This study by Tookman et al. examined how gynecological oncology clinicians in the UK use electronic health records (EHRs) and how the limitations of current systems affect clinical decision-making, particularly for ovarian cancer. The authors surveyed 92 multidisciplinary professionals - including oncologists, nurses, radiologists, and surgeons - to understand everyday barriers to retrieving key patient information. The findings were notably consistent: 92% of respondents used multiple EHR systems, and nearly a third navigated five or more systems for routine care. The use of multiple EHR methods often also translated into substantial inefficiency, with 17% of clinicians spending over half of their clinical time searching for information. The data showed that the most disruptive aspects of EHR systems were poor interoperability, difficulty finding high-value information (such as genetic testing results), and the absence of a coherent clinical summary. Even when this data existed, it was often noted to be scattered across systems or buried in unstructured text. Only 11% of clinicians felt that their current EHR system provided well-organized information that was suitable for decision-making, and 67% struggled to locate genetics reports - an essential component of ovarian cancer management. In response, the research team used input from clinicians, data engineers, and informatics specialists to build an integrated digital platform. The prototype aggregates structured and unstructured data into a single summary view, pulling from different EHR sources. Natural language processing pipelines help extract genomic, surgical, and narrative details from free-text records, and all derived datasets were validated against the original clinical systems. The platform provides a unified dashboard that is intended to improve safety, auditability, and multidisciplinary coordination.
Outcomes and Implications
For ovarian cancer care, treatment often relies on precise coordination of imaging, pathology, genomics, and operative findings. The current EHR ecosystem imposes unnecessary logistical burdens and fragmented records can mean that clinicians risk missing critical information, delaying care, or making decisions based on incomplete data. The demonstration that clinicians may spend >50% of their time on data retrieval demonstrates how EHR inefficiencies can translate directly into reduced clinical capacity and potentially compromised patient care outcomes. The proposed integrated informatics platform has incredible clinical relevance. By automatically consolidating data such as operative notes, genomic results, and radiology reports into a validated summary, this platform reduces clinician reliance on manual chart interpretation and supports real-time decision-making. Beyond ovarian cancer, this co-design framework offers a scalable blueprint for specialty-specific decision-support tools built directly around clinician workflows.