Is electronic prescribing the best system for preventing pharmacy
dispensing errors?
A comparative study, described here by Rod Beard, Principal
Pharmacist at City Hospitals Sunderland NHS Foundation Trust, and Carol
Candlish, Principal Lecturer at the University of Sunderland, adds
further insight into the relative potential merits of different systems.
ABSTRACT
City Hospitals Sunderland NHS Foundation Trust’s Pharmacy Services runs
several different dispensing systems for different service users, including
electronic prescribing (EP) to 1,000 acute beds.
Dispensing errors, along with error rates and average errors per person,
were studied. Error rate per person was a more useful tool to compare EP,
barcoding, manpower and planned work in reducing dispensing errors.
This study gives a tentative indication of the cost–benefit of different
systems for dispensing.
Br J Healthcare Comput Info Manage 2007; 24(1): 15–18 |
