Discuss The Impact Of Technology On Pharmacy Technician

In the UK, there are more than 1 billion scripts prescribed and dispensed every year (HSCIC, 2013). There are over 12,000 pharmacies in the UK, and approximately 1.6 million people visit a pharmacy every day (HSCIC, 2013). It is therefore natural to assume that between these 1 billion prescriptions, an error or mistake will be made. Current studies suggest that of all the dispensed medicines, there are approximately 0.01-3.32% errors made in community pharmacy and 0.02-2.7% in hospital pharmacy (James et all, 2009).

The stage 1 of the meaningful use includes thirteen core criteria and ten menu set objectives. The first core criteria is the computerized provider order entry (CPOE). CPOE entails the provider’s use of computer assistance to directly enter medication orders from a computer or mobile device. The use of CPOE and the electronic prescription process is a technology that has been found to be helpful in preventing medication prescribing errors in several ways (Mominah & Househ, 2013). Having an accurate electronic patient medication profile will help prescribers and pharmacists review the medication history easily and consequently alert the pharmacist to communicate with the prescriber in case any unexplained change in the prescribed medication to the patient and then conforming the change with the prescriber. Applying CPOE technology reduces medication errors.

Medication errors are among the most significant cause of patient injury in all types of medical errors (Johnson, Carlson, Tucker, & Willette, n.d). In the nursing profession, medication administration errors occur 34% of the time, second only to physician ordering errors (Gooder, 2011). The introduction of information technology, such as the Bar Code Medication Administration (BCMA), offers new opportunities for reducing medication administration errors. BCMA was developed by the Veteran’s Affairs Medical Center in 1998 to help improve the documentation of medication administration, decrease medication errors and provide

This is a journal study to investigate the perceptions and opinions of the professional community pharmacy staff about the causes of dispensing errors and strategies to prevent these errors. A survey was completed by pharmacists and pharmacy technicians in 49 community pharmacies and the response rate was 90.9% (Lopes, Joaquim, Matos & Pires, 2015). Handwritten prescriptions were the most single cause of medication errors 51.5% and drugs with similar packages 45.6% (Lopes et al., 2015). Checking prescriptions and confirmation of drugs through barcodes was 97% which were the most agreed prevention methods (Lopes et al., 2015). This article would not only be useful to pharmacy personnel but to other health practitioners or students performing research. In addition, a study similar to this could serve as an example (initiative) that may benefit management. Such initiative would be implemented to help improve medication

Encourage the use of computer-generated or electronic medication administration records. Plan for the implementation of computerized prescriber order entry systems. Consider the use of machine-readable code (i.e., bar coding) in the medication administration process. Use computerized drug profiling in the pharmacy. Be a demanding customer of pharmacy system software; encourage vendors to incorporate and assist in implementing an adequate standardized set of checks into computerized hospital pharmacy systems (e.g., screening for duplicate drug therapies, patient allergies, potential drug interactions, drug/lab interactions, dose ranges, etc.)”. (Association,

E prescribing can be a part of the EHR in Epic, which would include patient data, and not just prescription information. When e prescriptions are utilized in Epic, the medication is checked for interactions with the patient’s other medications and allergies. Check systems within Epic look for drug-allergy, drug-drug, and how the medication reacts with the disease. In a case study of 17 physicians in an ambulatory clinic conducted by Abramson et al., error rates from prescribing decreased from 35.7 per 100 prescriptions to 12.2 per 100 prescriptions in a year of e-prescribing as reviewed in this study. The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act of 2009 stated that healthcare providers would have access to EHRs to ensure the meaningful use standards per the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS). Meaningful use is attained by increasing the quality of patient outcomes by having access to the medication data, the patient’s history, and diagnosis by the prescriber. Prescribing is safer, when the provider is aware of the patient’s history, current medications, and allergies, therefore better patient outcomes. In the United States, the HITECH Act and the meaningful use standards stated by CMS have increased the use of e-prescribing per Friedman (2009). The CMS made e prescribing a

I cannot to begin to express how often prescription drug errors occur when physicians give patients handwritten prescriptions. E-Prescribing eliminates the chances of illegibility and misunderstanding of instructions on handwritten prescriptions.

This paper will review the implementation of the Electronic Medication Administration Record (eMAR) at Clayton Memorial Hospital, a 420-bed hospital, with a regional cancer center, cardiovascular services, ambulatory services and 24 physician practices in West Palm Beach, Florida. Through implementation of the eMAR, the 5 rights of medication administration are maintained (right patient, right medication, right dose, right route and right time), notifications are at the nurse’s fingertips, errors and warnings are readily available, allergy checking is automatically done, dose checking and other applicable clinical data are accessible. This paper will discuss one hospital’s journey on the path to medication safety.

As a result of implementing e-Rx for inbound prescriptions, patients would not need to carry prescriptions to get them filled back at the VA. Pharmacist would not have to enter the inbound prescriptions manually into the VistA, which can potentially present danger of medication errors, as reviewed in the secondary research in Chapter 2 above. Based on the qualitative

One of the most important steps in caring for hospitalized patients is medication administration. Patients come into the hospital to be treated so they will feel better, it does not matter what the physician does if the medications are not given to the patient they will not get better. According to McGonigle and Mastrian, the steps of administering medication have not changed in many years, they are “assessment of need, ordering, dispensing, administration, and evaluation” (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2012, p. 386). The purpose of this paper is explain the medication administration process that is used in my facility, to determine the technology used is effective.

E-Prescribing is the ability to send accurate prescriptions from the point of care to patient’s preferred pharmacy, electronically. E-prescriptions must be generated by prescribers (physicians or health care providers who are legally allowed to generate prescriptions).

E-Prescribing is an incentive by the Centre for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). It allows the electronic transmission of prescriptions between qualified medical practitioners and physicians. The aim of the program is to improve the drug prescription system by avoiding errors resulting from handwritten prescriptions. The E-prescribing program runs on various standards. These standards are spelt out and added in Part D of the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act 2003 (CMS, 2013).

Most of the prescribing procedure takes place in the emergency supervision area, where paper-based prescribing is most excessively used, so this setting holds an appreciable scope for electronic prescribing to be accomplished. E-prescribing has permitted prescribers to electrostatically transmit patient's medication particulars to pharmacy computers.

o solve some of the above-listed issues healthcare systems worldwide have developed easier ways to avoid medication errors and near miss issues such as the electronic medication record (EMAR), CPOE, bar-code medication administration on a portable cart, and automatic medication dispensers. While all these methods of medication administration systems seem to be a safer and easier way to administer medication, it can also be a long process, therefore, resulting in noncompliance behavior that is exhibited by some

Electronic-prescribing, often referred to as e-prescribing, is a fairly new, innovative way for physicians and other medical personnel to prescribe medications and keep track of patients’ medical history. Not only has e-prescribing enabled prescribers to electronically send a prescription to the patients’ pharmacy of choice, in the short amount of time it has been available, it has significantly reduced health care costs, not only for the patient, but for the medical facilities as well. In 2003, e-prescribing was included in the Medicare Modernization Act (MMA) which jumpstarted the role of e-prescribing in healthcare. It has proven to significantly reduce the yearly number medication errors and prescription fraud, and its widespread