Medication management in tertiary care hospitals

Sachin Raval

Medication management is one of the vital parts of patient care. Medication errors occurring most commonly in prescribing, dispensing or administration. Research from the USA suggests that medication errors often result from lack of sufficient information during the prescribing stage. Other work from the USA has estimated that each adverse drug event costs $2000–2500.

Medication management includes Prescription, Medication Reconciliation, Transcription, and Appropriateness review, Dispensing, Administration, Monitoring and Discardation of medications. Doctor follows the prescription writing rules, Pharmacists follows storage and Dispensing rules and Nurse follow the six rights of administration which is result in better outcomes of patient care.

High alert drug management is also very important for patient safety. Effective medication management and involvement of pharmacists in process can reduce the patient’s medication cost and over all reduce the stay of patient in hospitals.

Appropriateness review is most important for prevention of medications errors. Effective review process in tertiary care hospitals can significant reduce the errors happen during prescription and Transcription.