News -02-15-06 Better Communication Needed to Reduce Medication Errors (CaliforniaHealthLine.org) "The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations sent an alert to hospitals urging them to pay closer attention to the "medication reconciliation" process when patients are transferred between units or discharged, the AP/Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports. The commission alerted its 15,000 accredited hospitals and health organizations to avoid errors by accurately listing medications doses in "highly visible" places on patient charts and notifying staff of the information during transfers, as well as assuring that patients have accurate lists of medications and home instructions after being discharged." "JCAHO said that more than 2,000 medication reconciliation errors were received last year by U.S. Pharmacopeia, an independent group that maintains a voluntary error reporting program. JCAHO said data shows that 63% of reported medication errors resulting in death or injury were caused by lapses in communication." 2-06 -02-15-06 Patients Can Catch Hospital Errors (FREEP.com) "A report released last week found that 12% of 2,032 medication errors reported in radiology tests caused harm or death to patients. That's seven times more than all medication errors reviewed in a large computer database between 2000 and 2004. The Medmarx Data Report is a voluntary system used by 315 hospitals to report medication errors." "Too often, patients got the wrong drug, the wrong dose or no drug at all, or hospital employees failed to properly resume medicine that was stopped temporarily during testing, says John Santell of the U.S. Pharmacopeia's Center for Patient Safety, which conducted the analysis." Editor's Note: In addition to recommendations by the authors of the article, patients (or their advocates) can create a checklist of medications and dosages when the doctor visits and then make sure each day that when medications are delivered that they match the checklist. 2-06 -02-15-06 Prescribing Errors (BBC News) "A study suggests that prescribing errors in NHS hospitals could be putting patients at risk." "This is one of the first studies to look at prescribing errors in hospitals." "It suggests that many of the mistakes are being made by doctors in training." 2-06 -02-15-06 Study of Medications Errors in USA Hospitals (Medscape.com) "This study evaluated hospital demographics, staffing, pharmacy variables, health care outcomes measures (severity of illness-adjusted mortality rates, drug costs, total cost of care, and length of stay) and medication errors." 2-06 -02-15-06 Study: Cell Phones Reduce Hospital Errors (ConsumerAffairs.com) "Using cell phones in hospitals reduces the error rate in medical care because of more timely communication and rarely causes electronic magnetic interference, according to Yale School of Medicine researchers." 02-06 -02-15-06 Study: Hospital Emergency Room Errors (ConsumerAffairs.com) "An average of 195,000 Americans died annually in 2000, 2001 and 2002 because of potentially preventable, in-hospital medical errors, according to a study of 37 million patient records conducted by HealthGrades, a healthcare quality company." 02-06 -02-15-06 Study: Hospital Emergency Room Errors (MSNBC News) "The report helps support the logic behind a World Health Organization initiative to reduce such errors, which the U.S. Institute of Medicine estimates kill as many as 98,000 people every year in the United States alone." "The U.S. Food and Drug Administration estimates as many as 1.3 million Americans are injured by medication errors every year." 02-06 -07-20-06 Report: Patients Can Help Reduce Drug Errors (ABC News) "Keeping an updated medication list, double-checking the name of the drug dispensed at the pharmacy and asking more questions of doctors and pharmacists are just three of the many things patients can do to minimize their risk of a medication error." 07-06 Papers Dr. Haig: 10 Medical Missteps (Time.com) "When you show up complaining that something hurts, the easiest way for a doctor to get you out of the office is to send you off with a prescription for a pain medication that contains a narcotic (like Vicodin or OxyContin). The drugs are relatively easy to get and tempting to take, but you should never use them for chronic pain." 03-08 Editorial: Why Doctors So Often Get It Wrong (New York Times) "Studies of autopsies have shown that doctors seriously misdiagnose fatal illnesses about 20 percent of the time. So millions of patients are being treated for the wrong disease." "As shocking as that is, the more astonishing fact may be that the rate has not really changed since the 1930's." "A BIG part of the answer is that all of the other medical progress we have made has distracted us from the misdiagnosis crisis." 02-06 Ways to Avoid Hospital Overcharges (MSN MoneyCentral) "American hospitals are fleecing patients out of billions of dollars annually, and experts say that while some of the overcharges are honest errors, many are deliberate." 2-06

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