Dispensing errors are not only costing lives but also costing healthcare !!

Dispensing errors has been one of the leading causes of death in United States for years now and surprisingly, it accounts for almost 21% of all medications errors that occurs in healthcare system. Many dispensing errors made in community pharmacy include either dispensing the wrong drug, dose and quantity or inappropriate labeling, packaging, storage and directions for use. More often than not, these all dispensing medication errors has harmed the patient and increased the hospitalization of patients, and as a result, it has increased the healthcare cost. According to National observational study of prescription dispensing accuracy and safety in 50 pharmacies,  "dispensing errors occur at a rate of 4 per day in a pharmacy filling 250 prescriptions daily, which amounts to an estimated 51.5 million errors out of 3 billion prescriptions filled annually nationwide".  The main cause of these dispensing error is the faulty system so the key to reduce dispensing errors  is to implement the appropriate system. 

The appropriate system should include the followings in order to minimize the dispensing errors.

1.     Ensure correct entry of the prescription which should omit transcription errors.

2.     Confirm that the prescription is correct and complete which should omit illegible, ambiguous, call-in prescriptions.

3.     Beware of look-alike, soundalike drugs; specially for unfamiliar drug.

4.     Be careful with zeros and abbreviations; specially for drugs with narrow therapeutic windows.

5.     Organize the workplace.

6.     Reduce distraction when possible; specially avoid multitasking.

7.     Focus on reducing stress and balancing heavy workloads.

8.     Take the time to store drugs properly.

9.     Thoroughly check all prescriptions.

10.  Always provide thorough patient counseling.

(more details about these followings can be accessed through this article link: http://www.pharmacytimes.com/media/pdf/P2PdispensingErrors.pdf )

Since, a lot of part of dispensing is done by pharmacy technicians, I believe that pharmacists needs to be more alert and responsive in order to prevent these dispensing errors from occurring because pharmacy technicians almost don't have any knowledge about drugs which they are dispensing. Therefore, the pharmacists has to put more efforts in comprehensive checking prescriptions. In addition, we have a lot of medication error reporting systems (ISMP, MedWatch, MedMarx) in place to report medication errors which help alert healthcare professional to prevent from making the same medication errors that has happened in the past.  Therefore, every individual should take part in reporting a medication error to these institutes.  At last, we need to realize the seriousness of the dispensing errors and we should not blame individuals but the dispensing system, and take precautionary measures to prevent these all dispensing errors from occurs.