Evaluación de la implantación de prácticas seguras con los medicamentos en los Servicios de Medicina Intensiva / Assessment of the implementation of safe medication practices in Intensive Medicine Units

Objetivo Conocer el grado de implantación de las prácticas seguras con los medicamentos en los Servicios de Medicina Intensiva e identificar oportunidades de mejora. Diseño Estudio descriptivo multicéntrico. Ámbito Servicios de Medicina Intensiva. Participantes/procedimiento Cuarenta Servicios de Medicina Intensiva que voluntariamente cumplimentaron el «Cuestionario de autoevaluación de la seguridad del uso de los medicamentos en los Servicios de Medicina Intensiva» entre marzo y septiembre del 2020. El cuestionario contiene 147 ítems de evaluación agrupados en 10 elementos clave. Variables principales de interés Puntuación media y porcentaje medio sobre el valor máximo posible en el cuestionario completo, en los elementos clave y en los ítems de evaluación. Resultados La puntuación media del cuestionario completo en los Servicios de Medicina Intensiva fue de 436,8 (49,2% del valor máximo posible). No se encontraron diferencias según dependencia funcional, tamaño del hospital y tipo de servicio. Los elementos clave referentes a la incorporación de farmacéuticos en estos servicios, así como a la competencia y la formación de los profesionales en prácticas de seguridad, mostraron los valores más bajos (31,2% y 33,2%, respectivamente). Otros tres elementos clave relativos a la accesibilidad a la información sobre los pacientes y los medicamentos; a la estandarización, el almacenamiento y la distribución de los medicamentos, y a los programas de calidad y gestión de riesgos mostraron porcentajes inferiores al 50%. Conclusiones Se han identificado numerosas prácticas seguras efectivas cuyo grado de implantación en los Servicios de Medicina Intensiva es bajo y que es preciso abordar para reducir los errores de medicación en el paciente crítico (AU)

Objective To assess the level of implementation of medication safety practices in Intensive Care Units (ICUs) and to identify opportunities for improvement. Design A descriptive multicenter study was carried out. Setting Intensive Care Units. Participants/procedure A total of 40 ICUs voluntarily completed the “Medication use-system safety self-assessment for Intensive Care Units” between March and September 2020. The survey comprised 147 items for evaluation grouped into 10 key elements. Main variables Calculation was made of the mean scores and mean percentages based on the maximum possible values for the overall survey, for the key elements and for each individual item for evaluation. Results The mean score of the overall questionnaire among the participating ICUs was 436.8 (49.2% of the maximum possible score). No differences were found according to functional dependence, size of the hospital or type of ICU. The key elements referred to the incorporation of clinical pharmacists in these units, as well as the competence and training of the professionals in safety practices yielded the lowest values (31.2% and 33.2%, respectively). Three other key elements related to accessibility to information about patients and medicines; to the standardization, storage and distribution of medicines; and to the quality and risk management programs, yielded percentages below 50%. Conclusions Numerous effective safety medication practices have been identified with a low level of implementation in ICUs. This situation must be addressed in order to reduce medication errors in critically ill patients (AU)

Assessment of the implementation of safe medication practices in Intensive Medicine Units.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the level of implementation of medication safety practices in Intensive Care Units (ICUs) and to identify opportunities for improvement. DESIGN: A descriptive multicenter study was carried out. SETTING: Intensive Care Units. PARTICIPANTS/PROCEDURE: A total of 40 ICUs voluntarily completed the "Medication use-system safety self-assessment for Intensive Care Units" between March and September 2020. The survey comprised 147 items for evaluation grouped into 10 key elements. MAIN VARIABLES: Calculation was made of the mean scores and mean percentages based on the maximum possible values for the overall survey, referred to the key elements and to each individual item for evaluation. RESULTS: The mean score of the overall questionnaire among the participating ICUs was 436.8 (49.2% of the maximum possible score). No differences were found according to functional dependence, size of the hospital or type of ICU. The key elements referred to the incorporation of clinical pharmacists in these Units, as well as the competence and training of the professionals in safety practices yielded the lowest values (31.2% and 33.2%, respectively). Three other key elements related to accessibility to information about patients and medicines; to the standardization, storage and distribution of medicines; and to the quality and risk management programs, yielded percentages <50%. CONCLUSIONS: Numerous effective safety medication practices have been identified with a low level of implementation in ICUs. This situation must be addressed in order to reduce medication errors in critically ill patients.

Assessment of the implementation of safe medication practices in Intensive Medicine Units. / Evaluación de la implantación de prácticas seguras con los medicamentos en los Servicios de Medicina Intensiva.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the level of implementation of medication safety practices in Intensive Care Units (ICUs) and to identify opportunities for improvement. DESIGN: A descriptive multicenter study was carried out. SETTING: Intensive Care Units. PARTICIPANTS/PROCEDURE: A total of 40 ICUs voluntarily completed the "Medication use-system safety self-assessment for Intensive Care Units" between March and September 2020. The survey comprised 147 items for evaluation grouped into 10 key elements. MAIN VARIABLES: Calculation was made of the mean scores and mean percentages based on the maximum possible values for the overall survey, for the key elements and for each individual item for evaluation. RESULTS: The mean score of the overall questionnaire among the participating ICUs was 436.8 (49.2% of the maximum possible score). No differences were found according to functional dependence, size of the hospital or type of ICU. The key elements referred to the incorporation of clinical pharmacists in these units, as well as the competence and training of the professionals in safety practices yielded the lowest values (31.2% and 33.2%, respectively). Three other key elements related to accessibility to information about patients and medicines; to the standardization, storage and distribution of medicines; and to the quality and risk management programs, yielded percentages below 50%. CONCLUSIONS: Numerous effective safety medication practices have been identified with a low level of implementation in ICUs. This situation must be addressed in order to reduce medication errors in critically ill patients.

Effectiveness of a 'do not interrupt' vest intervention to reduce medication errors during medication administration: a multicenter cluster randomized controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: The use of a 'do not interrupt' vest during medication administration rounds is recommended but there have been no controlled randomized studies to evaluate its impact on reducing administration errors. We aimed to evaluate the impact of wearing such a vest on reducing such errors. The secondary objectives were to evaluate the types and potential clinical impact of errors, the association between errors and several risk factors (such as interruptions), and nurses' experiences. METHODS: This was a multicenter, cluster, controlled, randomized study (March-July 2017) in 29 adult units (4 hospitals). Data were collected by direct observation by trained observers. All nurses from selected units were informed. A 'Do not interrupt' vest was implemented in all units of the experimental group. A poster was placed at the entrance of these units to inform patients and relatives. The main outcome was the administration error rate (number of Opportunities for Error (OE), calculated as one or more errors divided by the Total Opportunities for Error (TOE) and multiplied by 100). RESULTS: We enrolled 178 nurses and 1346 patients during 383 medication rounds in 14 units in the experimental group and 15 units in the control group. During the intervention period, the administration error rates were 7.09% (188 OE with at least one error/2653 TOE) for the experimental group and 6.23% (210 OE with at least one error/3373 TOE) for the control group (p = 0.192). Identified risk factors (patient age, nurses' experience, nurses' workload, unit exposition, and interruption) were not associated with the error rate. The main error type observed for both groups was wrong dosage-form. Most errors had no clinical impact for the patient and the interruption rates were 15.04% for the experimental group and 20.75% for the control group. CONCLUSIONS: The intervention vest had no impact on medication administration error or interruption rates. Further studies need to be performed taking into consideration the limitations of our study and other risk factors associated with other interventions, such as nurse's training and/or a barcode system. TRIAL REGISTRATION: The PERMIS study protocol (V2-1, 11/04/2017) was approved by institutional review boards and ethics committees (CPP Ile de France number 2016-A00211-50, CNIL 21/03/2017, CCTIRS 11/04/2016). It is registered at ClinicalTrials.gov (registration number: NCT03062852 , date of first registration: 23/02/2017).

Es el momento de revisar cómo se preparany administran los medicamentos inyectablesen los hospitales europeos / Time to review how injectable medicines are prepared and administered in European hospitals

Desde hace décadas se conoce que el uso de los medicamentos inyectables en los hospitales europeos se encuentra asociado a numerosos errores de medicación, algunos de los cuales provocan daños graves y muertes prevenibles. Se han publicado investigaciones e informes nacionales yeuropeos sobre la mejora de la seguridad del paciente que recomiendanuna mayor utilización de las unidades de preparación aséptica de los servicios de farmacia y la provisión de los medicamentos inyectables listos parasu administración, recomendaciones que apenas se han implementado.En Inglaterra, la experiencia de tratar a los pacientes con infecciónpor COVID-19 ha puesto de manifiesto otros beneficios que conlleva laampliación de las unidades de preparación aséptica de los servicios defarmacia. Estos beneficios incluyen ahorrar tiempo de enfermería, disponerde sistemas con mayor resiliencia y capacidad, reducir la variabilidad enla práctica, mejorar la satisfacción del personal clínico y del paciente, yfacilitar la administración de más medicamentos inyectables a los pacientesen sus domicilios. También se ha reconocido que se precisan actuacionesdirigidas a estandarizar las directrices y procedimientos de utilización delos medicamentos inyectables e implementar el uso de dispositivos de infusión inteligentes con software de reducción de errores de dosis, con el finde minimizar los errores en la administración de estos medicamentos. Los farmacéuticos de hospital tienen un papel clave en el desarrollo de estasactividades para que los servicios que prestan las farmacias hospitalarias europeas estén más en consonancia con los que se proporcionan en Norteamérica. (AU)

It has been known, for decades, that the use of injectable medicines inEuropean hospitals has been associated with frequent medication errors,some of which cause preventable severe harms and deaths. There havebeen national and European inquiries and reports concerning improvingpatient safety by recommending greater use of pharmacy aseptic preparation services and provision of ready-to administer injectables, which havenot been widely implemented.In England experience of treating patients with COVID-19 infectionshas brought into focus other benefits of significantly extending pharmacyaseptic preparation services. These benefits include saving nursing time,having systems in place which have resilience and capacity, reducingvariation in practice, improving clinical staff and patient experience, andenabling more injectable medicines to be administered to patients athome. It has also been recognised that more action is required to standardise policies and procedures for injectable medicines and implement theuse of smart infusion devices with dose error reduction software, to helpminimise drug administration errors.Hospital pharmacists have a key role in developing these servicesto bring European hospitals more in line with those provided by hospitalpharmacies in North America. (AU)

Hospital medication errors: a cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND: Medication errors (MEs) are among the most common types of incidents reported in Australian and international hospitals. There is no uniform method of reporting and reducing these errors. This study aims to identify the incidence, time trends, types and factors associated with MEs in a large regional hospital in Australia. METHODS: A 5-year cross-sectional study. RESULTS: The incidence of MEs was 1.05 per 100 admitted patients. The highest frequency of errors was observed during the colder months of May-August. When distributed by day of the week, Mondays and Tuesdays had the highest frequency of errors. When distributed by hour of the day, time intervals from 7 am to 8 am and from 7 pm to 8 pm showed a sharp increase in the frequency of errors. One thousand and eighty-eight (57.8%) MEs belonged to incidence severity rating (ISR) level 4 and 787 (41.8%) belonged to ISR level 3. There were six incidents of ISR level 2 and only one incident of ISR level 1 reported during the five-year period 2014-2018. Administration-only errors were the most common accounting for 1070 (56.8%) followed by prescribing-only errors (433, 23%). High-risk medications were associated with half the number of errors, the most common of which were narcotics (17.9%) and antimicrobials (13.2%). CONCLUSIONS: MEs continue to be a problem faced by international hospitals. Inexperience of health professionals and nurse-patient ratios might be the fundamental challenges to overcome. Specific training of junior staff in prescribing and administering medication and nurse workload management could be possible solutions to reducing MEs in hospitals.

Pharmacological Interactions in the Elderly.

Pharmacological therapy in the elderly is particularly complicated and challenging. Due to coexistence of three main predisposing factors (advanced age, multiple morbidity and polypharmacotherapy), this group of patients is prone to occurrence of drug interactions and adverse effects of incorrect drug combinations. Since many years patient safety during the treatment process has been one of key elements for proper functioning of healthcare systems around the world, thus different preventive measures have been undertaken in order to counteract factors adversely affecting the therapeutic effect. One of the avoidable medical errors is pharmacological interactions. According to estimates, one in six elderly patients may be at risk of a significant drug interaction. Hence the knowledge about mechanisms and causes of drug interactions in the elderly, as well as consequences of their occurrence are crucial for planning the process of pharmacotherapy. For the purpose of pharmacovigilance, a review of available methods and tools gives an insight into possible ways of preventing drug interactions. Additionally, recognizing the actual scale of this phenomenon in geriatric population around the world emphasizes the importance of a joint effort among medical community to improve quality of pharmacotherapy.

Developing a list of high-alert medications for patients with chronic diseases.

BACKGROUND: Patients with chronic diseases often receive multiple medications and are associated with increased vulnerability to medication errors. Identifying high-alert medications for them would help to prioritize the interventions with greatest impact for improving medication safety. The aim of this study was to develop a list of high-alert medications for patients with chronic illnesses (HAMC list) that would prove useful to the Spanish National Health Service strategies on chronicity. METHODS: The RAND/UCLA appropriateness method was used. Drug classes/drugs candidates to be included on the HAMC list were identified from a literature search in MedLine, bulletins issued by patient safety organizations, incidents recorded in Spanish incident reporting systems, and previous lists. Eighteen experts in patient/medication safety or in chronic diseases scored candidate drugs for appropriateness according to three criteria (evidence, benefit and feasibility of implementing safety practices). Additionally they rated their priority of inclusion on a Likert scale. RESULTS: The final HAMC list includes 14 drug classes (oral anticoagulants, narrow therapeutic range antiepileptics, antiplatelets - including aspirin -, antipsychotics, ß-blockers, benzodiazepines and analogues, corticosteroids long-term use, oral cytostatics, oral hypoglycemic drugs, immunosuppressants, insulins, loop diuretics, nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, and opioid analgesics), and 4 drugs or pairs of drugs (amiodarone/ dronedarone, digoxin, oral methotrexate and spironolactone/eplerenone). CONCLUSIONS: An initial list of high-alert medications for patients with chronic diseases has been developed, which can be built into the medication management strategies for chronicity to guide the implementation of efficient safety strategies and to identify those patients at greater risk for preventable adverse drug events.

Drug interaction alert override rates in the Meaningful Use era: no evidence of progress.

BACKGROUND: Interruptive drug interaction alerts may reduce adverse drug events and are required for Stage I Meaningful Use attestation. For the last decade override rates have been very high. Despite their widespread use in commercial EHR systems, previously described interventions to improve alert frequency and acceptance have not been well studied. OBJECTIVES: (1) To measure override rates of inpatient medication alerts within a commercial clinical decision support system, and assess the impact of local customization efforts. (2) To compare override rates between drug-drug interaction and drug-allergy interaction alerts, between attending and resident physicians, and between public and academic hospitals. (3) To measure the correlation between physicians' individual alert quantities and override rates as an indicator of potential alert fatigue. METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed physician responses to drug-drug and drug-allergy interaction alerts, as generated by a common decision support product in a large teaching hospital system. RESULTS: (1) Over four days, 461 different physicians entered 18,354 medication orders, resulting in 2,455 visible alerts; 2,280 alerts (93%) were overridden. (2) The drug-drug alert override rate was 95.1%, statistically higher than the rate for drug-allergy alerts (90.9%) (p < 0.001). There was no significant difference in override rates between attendings and residents, or between hospitals. (3) Physicians saw a mean of 1.3 alerts per day, and the number of alerts per physician was not significantly correlated with override rate (R2 = 0.03, p = 0.41). CONCLUSIONS: Despite intensive efforts to improve a commercial drug interaction alert system and to reduce alerting, override rates remain as high as reported over a decade ago. Alert fatigue does not seem to contribute. The results suggest the need to fundamentally question the premises of drug interaction alert systems.