Electronic Prescription Codes and AI: benefits and opportunities from Blood Collection Centers access to report generationNumero di ricetta elettronica e IA: vantaggi e opportunità dall'accesso ai Centri Prelievi alla produzione del referto

Access to Blood Collection Centers for laboratory tests is managed through a dematerialized prescription (DEMA), uniquely identified by an Electronic Prescription Number (NRE). In this study, we assessed the correspondence between prescribed and actually delivered services at the Blood Collection Centers of ULSS 5 Polesana. The analysis confirmed an important issue already highlighted in 2021: a substantial mismatch between prescribed and performed services. When extrapolated to a national scale, this discrepancy amounts to approximately 3 million missed services per year across Italy. We present a solution based on NRE and artificial intelligence (AI) that could help address the issue of undelivered services, which not only causes personal inconvenience for users but could also negatively affect health outcomes due to delays in diagnosis and/or treatment. The matching, via supervised AI systems, of NRE with the related services, their classification, the service availability at hospital and local collection centers, along with data such as the prescribing physician, the patient’s identity, geographic area, and wait times, could enable the generation of real-time messages at the time of the DEMA issuance. These messages would provide users with helpful information to support service delivery.