Abstract

STUDY OF FACTORS INFLUENCING THE MEDICATION ERRORS IN THE HEALTHCARE SYSTEM

Majed Isa*, Mohammed Hamaidi and Hosni Farah

ABSTRACT

Medication error is any preventable event that may cause or lead to inappropriate medication use or patient harm while the medication is in control of the health care professional, patient or consumer. Studies done since the 1970's have shown the high incidences of medical errors and deaths resulting from these errors. Only 3% of physicians believe that medical errors are a principal health concern since there is more concern to car accidents. Medical error statistics in the United States are enormous and alarming. The American medical system is the number one killer in the U.S. In ten years; the deaths caused by conventional medicine are approximately 8 million. The proposal concerns with the determination of errors during the process of treatment such as self-medication, prescribing errors, lack of knowledge, lack of attention, poor drug selection and poor monitoring. The community pharmacy errors such as, wrong quantity, wrong drug, wrong dosage form, wrong strength and wrong information (label). Most of patient errors come from the drug administration, patient personality, education and culture. Health care cost savings, Improves the image of the pharmacist and helps pharmacy to become a true clinical profession. Teaching patients about their medication and their diseases also help to prevent medication errors. Most of countries have a statistical data concerning the medication errors and comparing these data may lead to reduce and detect the parameters of medication errors. This study Investigates the parameters of self-medication in the population and their relationship with the medication errors. The sample size of our study was 600 (n=600); healthcare professions (200) and public (400). The study suggests that participants agree that factors such as, knowledge, information, self-medication and organization have an impact on medication errors with percentages of 78.2%, 61.8%, 67.2%, 83.6%, respectively. The rate of medication errors in one tertiary hospital was about 40%.

Keywords: Medication errors, healthcare, pharmacy, patient, self-medication.