As part of broader effort to identify success factors for implementing computerized physician order entry(CPOE), factors specific to the ambulatory setting were investigated in the field at Kaiser Permanente Northwest. A multidisciplinary team of five qualitative researchers spent seven months at four clinics conducting observations, interviews, and focus groups. The team analyzed the data using a combination of template and grounded theory approaches. The result is a description of fourteen themes, clustered into technology, organizational,personal, and environmental categories. While similar to inpatient study results in many respects,this outpatient CPO investigation generated subtly different themes.