Medication Errors in an Emergency Department in a Large Teaching Hospital in Tehran

Authors

  • Arash Rashidian Department of Health Management and Economics, School of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Iran.
  • Fatemeh Dabaghzadeh 1- Department of Clinical Pharmacy, School of Pharmacy, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. 2- School of Pharmacy, Kerman Medical University, Kerman, Iran.
  • Hassan Torkamandi Pharmaceutical Care Department, Dr. Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Iran.
  • Mohammadreza Javadi 1- Department of Clinical Pharmacy, School of Pharmacy, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. 2- Research Center for Rational Use of Drugs, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
  • Sara Alahyari Pharmaceutical Care Department, Dr. Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Iran.
  • Shadi Farsaei Department of Clinical Pharmacy, School of Pharmacy, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
  • Somayeh Hanafi Pharmaceutical Care Department, Dr. Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Iran.
Abstract:

Medication errors have important effects on increased length of hospitalization, increased mortality and costs. We assessed the incidence of medication errors and characterize the error types in an emergency department in a large teaching hospital in Tehran. We also investigated the effect of Emergency Department pharmacists on patient safety with regard to recovery of potentially harmful medication errors. The study was conducted in the 24 bed emergency department from February to March, 2010 at a 600-bed teaching hospital. Two hospital pharmacists and two clinical pharmacy residents observed care provision and collected data on medication errors. Demographic data, type of medication error, the recorded stage of error, date and time of occurrence and report, who made the error, probability of error were recorded from medical records. We used chi-squared and independent sample t- tests for analyzing the data. We recorded 203 medication errors during 180 hours. The incidence of medication errors was 50.5% at various levels in the emergency department.     Significant difference in age means     was seen between the patients with and without medication errors.     Seventy four point nine   percent of errors were recorded as definitely an error. Most recorded errors were made by nurses (44.5%) and occurred in administrating stage (63.6%). Given that the rate of the errors was relatively high, it seems that the presence of clinical pharmacist can be beneficial.

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Journal title

volume 12  issue 4

pages  937- 942

publication date 2013-11-01

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