Medication Errors only Make Sense in Specific Context: A Context-Sensitive Understanding of Medication Errors

Medication errors are 20% of all medical errors in hospitals. Medication error rates vary through the different steps or contexts of the process: prescribing (49% of errors) to transcribing (1%), dispensing (12%), Administration (49%), Ingestion (3%), and monitoring (5%). Our understanding of medication errors would be improved if research examined errors within each context. We review the different types and sources of error in each context and the factors that lead to different rates of the "5 rights of medication administration.