Table 2.

Cognitive cues involved in clinicians’ detection of potentially harmful drug–drug interactions (DDIs), as listed in figure 1 step 1.

Cognitive cue #	Definition	Quote
1. Alert in EHR	Clinician learns about a potential DDI via a computerised DDI alert in the EHR.	“An alert popped for the linezolid:bupropion interaction.”—physician A
2. Detected on own	Clinician recognises the DDI concern based on their own knowledge about interacting medications, independent of any alert.	“So anytime I see amiodarone or warfarin on the same patient…[I see if] the interaction has already been accounted for….so I do that routinely on any patient that’s on both of those medications.”—pharmacist A
3. Notified by another individual	The clinician becomes aware of a potential DDI because a DDI concern is raised by another individual, such as the patient, caregiver or another clinician.	“…they dispensed the medication, and then the [patient’s] son called back concerned about the drug interaction.”—pharmacist B

Cues were derived from inductive qualitative analysis of clinicians’ reported incidents. The table above presents a definition for each cue, along with an example of a quote.

DDI, drug–drug interaction; EHR, electronic health record.