All Journals from Marie Richards
Abstract
Introduction: Poor drug history documentation on admission may lead to medication errors; a leading cause of avoidable harm.
Aims: To assess the quality of drug histories in the notes of patients admitted to an emergency assessment unit and impact of interventions to improve documentation.
Methods: Data were collected on the accuracy of documentation in 281 drug histories including errors of omission, frequency and dose.
Results: The mean error rate was high at more than five per drug history. Omitted drugs included warfarin and long-term steroids, the consequences of which were potentially serious. Clerking prompts and education alone did not improve errors significantly.
Conclusion: The error rate in drug histories is unacceptably high. More research is needed to explore factors involved in such documentation errors.
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Abstract
Aim: To establish the nature and frequency of discrepancies identified by pharmacy staff during medicines reconciliation.(MR)
Methods: Pharmacy staff collected data prospectively from 161 patients over a 1 week period, including information on any prescription errors identified.
Results: In total, 62 patients (48%) taking one or more medications prior to admission to hospital had one or more discrepancies found by pharmacy staff during MR. The most common discrepancy was omission of one or more drugs.
Conclusions: Pharmacy staff identified several unintentional discrepancies in prescribing of medications at admission to hospital. Doctors should ensure that intentional changes to patient prescriptions are clearly documented.
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