The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 276 No 7403 p648
3 June 2006

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Patients not given full details about take-home medicines

Only 40 per cent of inpatients believe they are given a complete explanation about their medicines' side effects when leaving hospital, according to results of a 2005 survey released last week by the Healthcare Commission.

The experiences of over 80,000 people who stayed for at least one night in hospital at one of 165 NHS trusts were included in the results. The survey also reveals that nearly two fifths of patients believe that their discharge had been delayed, with more than half of these saying they were delayed for two or more hours (53 per cent), most often because they were waiting for medicines from the pharmacy (61 per cent).

Over three quarters of patients said that they received a complete explanation about the purposes of their take-home medicines (79 per cent), but less than two thirds of patients thought that they were given “completely” clear written information about their medicines (62 per cent).