The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 274 No 7339 p263
5 March 2005

This article
Reprint   Photocopy

  Acrobat Reader

News summary

Half of drug histories taken on admission inaccurate

Health care systems need to explore ways to improve the accuracy of patients’ medication histories taken on admission to hospital, say researchers. This could involve pharmacist consultations or computer systems that allow transfer of medication histories between primary and secondary care.

The researchers found that over half of older patients taking at least four medicines at the time of admission to a teaching hospital in Toronto had unintended changes made to their therapy. More than a third of these changes had the potential to cause moderate or severe harm (Archives of Internal Medicine 2005;165:424).