Exploring the common prescribing errors that occur in the emergency department

Area of Science:

• Pharmacovigilance
• Health Services Research
• Patient Safety

Background:

• Prescribing errors are a type of medication error occurring on prescription forms.
• Patients discharged from the emergency department (ED) often receive prescriptions for community pharmacies.
• Prescribing errors necessitate patients returning to the ED for prescription correction, delaying medication access.

Purpose of the Study:

• To determine the most frequent prescribing errors on prescriptions returned to an inner-city ED in South Wales.
• To analyze the types and frequency of prescribing errors identified in community pharmacy returns.

Main Methods:

• Prescriptions returned to the ED over a six-week period (September-October 2016) were retrospectively analyzed.
• The study identified types of prescribing errors and their frequencies.
• Data from 10,218 ED attendances were reviewed, focusing on 322 patients discharged with prescriptions.

Main Results:

• A total of 20 (6%) of 322 discharged patients returned with a prescription error.
• The most common prescribing error identified was incorrect or missing prescriber information.
• The overall rate of prescribing errors was low and comparable to existing literature.

Conclusions:

• The study found a low incidence of prescribing errors on ED discharge prescriptions.
• Incorrect or missing prescriber information was the primary error type.
• Implementing electronic prescribing in the ED could significantly mitigate common prescribing errors and improve patient safety.