OBJECTIVES Transitions in patient care pose an increased risk to patient safety. One way to reduce this risk is to ensure accurate medication reconciliation during the transition. Here we present an evaluation of an electronic medication reconciliation module we developed to reduce the transition risk in patients referred for home healthcare. METHODS Nineteen physicians with experience in man...

OBJECTIVE To assess the impact of ambulatory clinical pharmacist medication therapy assessment and reconciliation for patients postdischarge in terms of hospital readmission rates, financial savings, and medication discrepancies. SETTING Group Health Cooperative (Group Health) in Washington State, from September 2009 through February 2010. PRACTICE DESCRIPTION Group Health is a nonprofit in...

BACKGROUND In 2005, The Joint Commission included medication reconciliation as a National Patient Safety Goal to reduce medication errors related to omissions, duplications and interactions. Hospitals continue to struggle to implement successful programmes that meet these objectives. METHODS The authors used improvement methods and reliability principles to develop and implement a process for...

PURPOSE The feasibility of implementing an electronic system for targeted pharmacist- and nurse-conducted admission and discharge medication reconciliation and its effects on patient safety, cost, and satisfaction among providers and nurses were studied. METHODS This study was conducted in two phases: a preimplementation phase and a postimplementation phase. In the preimplementation phase, ad...

PURPOSE The effect of pharmacist conducted medication reconciliation on compliance with a hospital's medication reconciliation policy was studied. METHODS In this eight-week pilot study, one pharmacist worked in the emergency department (ED) to facilitate the safe and accurate transfer of medication histories for admitted patients. During the first four weeks, retrospective chart review was p...

AIMS To determine the incidence of unintended medication discrepancies in paediatric patients at the time of hospital admission; evaluate the process of medicines reconciliation; assess the benefit of medicines reconciliation in preventing clinical harm. METHOD A 5 month prospective multisite study. Pharmacists at four English hospitals conducted admission medicines reconciliation in children...

A Prescription for Safer Care: Medication Reconciliation Reducing medication-related errors is a priority for advancing safe, quality healthcare in Canada, and four national organizations are tackling it head on. Accreditation Canada, the Canadian Institute for Health Information, the Canadian Patient Safety Institute (CPSI) and the Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) Canada released...

BACKGROUND An accurate medication list at hospital admission is essential for the evaluation and further treatment of patients. The objective of this study was to describe the frequency, type and predictors of errors in medication history, and to evaluate the extent to which standard care corrects these errors. METHODS A descriptive study was carried out in two medical wards in a Swedish hosp...

M edication reconciliation, a process by which a health care provider obtains and documents a thorough medication history with specific attention to comparing current and previous medication use, has been a focus of major patient safety initiatives. Evaluations of medication reconciliation programs have reported factors associated with successful implementation and its effect on prescribing out...