Prescription Errors

The most useful data for correcting errors in this prescription process is data that outlines where the majority of the errors occur. There are a wide variety of possibilities and errors that can occur in the prescription process, therefore having data that helps to pinpoint where most issues occur would be very helpful. Once it is understood where the majority of the errors occur, analysis can be done and solutions can be analyzed to fix the problem area(s). As seen on the Medication Errors – Error Reporting pie chart, a vast majority of medication errors can be traced to either administration or prescribing of the medication (Griffith). This means when process improving to reduce prescription errors, these two areas should be the initial
“The five main categories of traditional prescribing errors are wrong patient; wrong drug; wrong dose, strength, or frequency; wrong drug formulation; and wrong quantity. Out of those main categories, the four most common errors observed were wrong drug quantity (40%), wrong duration of therapy (21%), wrong dosing directions (19%), and wrong dosage formulation (11%).” (Graham and Scudder). Some common errors of prescribing would be: wrote the prescription incorrectly, illegible handwriting leads to miscommunication, and physician error of simply choosing the incorrect medication/dosage when writing the
If those three root problems are resolved, the amount of prescription errors will plummet. One way to determine how successful the updated process checks are would be keeping track of the amount of errors found in each of these newly added checks. By collecting data on the number of errors found in each of these process checks, two things will be accomplished. First, with each error that is found and subsequently corrected, that is one less medication error passed on to the patient. Secondly, using the data of where in the process each error is discovered, we can determine two things. First is if there is a bigger issue than previously thought and more changes are needed. The second of these is whether the process checks implemented are adequately catching the errors or if more changes need to be made to reduce the errors. For example, maybe in the month of July, thirty errors were found in the third process check (verifying that the medication is being provided to the correct patient). Conversely, only one error was found in the first process check (verification of prescription accuracy). In this example, either additional checks or a change to the check process should be implemented so this first process