Journal of Orthodontics & Endodontics

Relationship between omission, commission of errors and number of drugs prescribed

Medication prescribing error is common; the consequences of such errors are more harmful and frequent among patients in the hospital. The specific aim of the study was to identify the relationship between the number of drugs prescribed and the number of errors (omissions and commissions). Methods: Prospective cross-sectional study was performed in the special security force hospital in Riyadh. The 300 prescriptions were collected from the central pharmacy with full sampling procedure to select the prescriptions; the study used a descriptive and inferential analysis to answer the research questions. Results: A total of 759 drugs were prescribed, in which 4118 errors were discovered in the prescriptions (2408 omissions errors, 1710 commissions errors), the most common omission errors in the prescription under study was to omit patient gender, in which nearly all the prescription did not determine the gender of patients, following by omit name of department 298 (99.3%), the most common commission errors was illegible writing 650 (86%) in the prescriptions under study, following by omit strength of drugs 464 (61.4%), omit route of drug administration’s 417 (55.2%). The most common drugs prescribed through the study periods were analgesics 203 (26.9%) and the second highest category of drugs were antibiotics (antibacterial) 136 (18%), the most common drugs subjected to prescribing errors were analgesic 27.10%, antibiotics 15.20% and bronchodilators 10.70%, there is a strong positive correlation between the number of drugs prescribed and the number of commission errors. Conclusions: Application of modification prescriptions forms, structured prescribing training program, strict legislation measures relating to drugs prescriptions and development of system by applying CPOE and CDSS are among the necessary intervention(s) that may reduce the prescription errors, increase the patient safety and protect them from medication errors.

Author(s):

Ibrahim Alowayyed

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