As stated in the study "Preventing Medication Errors: Quality Chasm
Series" conducted by the Institute of Medicine (IOM), Committee on Identifying and Preventing Medication
Errors and sponsored by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, "...a hospital patient is
subject to at least one medication error per day, with considerable
variation in error rates across facilities..." and "...The committee estimates
that at least 1.5 million preventable ADEs occur each year in the United
States...". One of the "...efficacious error prevention strategies..." for reduction in Adverse Drug Events (ADE) sited by the study was electronic prescribing systems "...that check dosages and monitor
for harmful drug–drug interactions...". To read the free executive summary of this study, visit: http://www.nap.edu/execsumm_pdf/11623.pdf, (303.41kb .pdf) or, to purchase the full study, visit http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=11623
Among many other electronic prescribing benefits to patients, physicians, pharmacies, hospitals and tax payers are the following:
- Prevents medication prescription errors caused by events such as illigible hand writing, look-alike or sound-alike drugs, drug-to-drug interactions, incorrect dosing, drug allergy reactions, duplication of drugs, etc. and, thereby, reduces health care and legal costs;
- Eliminates illegible prescriptions;
- Provides for real-time communications between doctors, pharmacies and patients;
- Provides critical drug alerts and patient specific information at the health care professionals' fingertips;
- Provides drug pricing information;
- Provides payer coverage and preferred drug information;
- Creates a complete patient medication history;
- Reduces fraud and crime;
- Increases health care professional work efficiency and reduces administrative costs; and
- Expedites refills.
For more on the advantages of electronic prescribing, you may view the below articles or click on the Consumers, Health Care Providers and Pharmacies menu items at the top of this page:
www.henryford.com/body.cfm?xyzpdqabc=0&id=46335&action=detail&ref=560;
www.jamia.org/cgi/content/abstract/13/3/239; and
CCHITPhysiciansGuide2007.pdf (1.46mb .pdf)
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