Evaluation of Medication Errors in Medicine and Orthopaedic Wards of a Tertiary Care Hospital, India: A Prospective and Observational Study

Medication errors are commonly due to various reasons. Understanding and minimizing the mistakes will benefit society by reducing the cost and untoward effects of the medications; hence the presented study is carried out.

The primary goal of this study was to detect and evaluate the incidence, types, factors, and severity of medication errors in the medicine and orthopedic wards of a tertiary care hospital in India.

This study was carried out in the Department of Medicine and Orthopedic wards of the Teaching Hospital and Research Centre. The required data were collected in the Case Record Form and reviewed daily from admission to discharge in the posted department. Different medication errors were identified and documented, and the severity of medication errors was determined using NCC MERP guidelines.

A total of 200 inpatient cases from the orthopedic and medicine wards were collected, 100 cases from each ward. In an orthopedic ward, 40% of patients were 20-39 years of age, and in a medical ward, 48% were 60-79 years of age. A total of 136 and 103 medication errors were observed in the orthopedic and medical wards. Among them, 65% and 62% were prescription errors, 25% and 18% were administration errors, 6% and 12% were transcription errors, and 4% and 8% were dispensing errors. The cause of medication errors was 64.7%, 62.1% were due to physicians, 31.6% and 30.1% were due to nurses, and 3.7% and 7.8% were due to pharmacists in orthopedic and medicine wards. The majority of medication errors, 68.4%, and 62.1%, belonged to category-B severity in the orthopedic and medicine ward, respectively.

The clinical pharmacist can play a significant role in preventing medication errors by early detection. However, since our medication treatment system needs a well-organized detection and reporting mechanism, Hence, as the first step, we must implement a system where mistakes/Errors are routinely detected and reported.