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Drug shortages: shortchanging quality and safe patient care
Drug shortages: shortchanging quality and safe patient care
- Collection:
- Health Policy and Services Research
- Series Title(s):
- Pennsylvania patient safety advisory
- Author(s):
- Cierniak, Kayla H., author
Gaunt, Michael J., author
Grissinger, Matthew, author - Contributor(s):
- Pennsylvania. Patient Safety Authority, issuing body.
- Publication:
- [Harrisburg, Pa.] : Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority, March 2019
- Language(s):
- English
- Format:
- Text
- Subject(s):
- Prescription Drugs -- supply & distribution
Medication Errors -- statistics & numerical data
Pennsylvania
United States - Genre(s):
- Technical Report
- Abstract:
- Drug shortages are a public health crisis that has persisted for many years in the U.S. health system. The daily struggle of shortage management by healthcare providers has led to negative downstream effects on patients, including instances of unsafe or compromised practice and potentially harmful medication errors. A total of 448 medication error event reports associated with drug shortages were submitted to the Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority from July 2004 through June 2018. Nearly three-quarters (71.0%; n = 318) of events reached the patient. Drug shortage reports involved 173 individual drugs, representing 57 different drug classes, with the most commonly reported drugs being analgesics, followed by antibiotics, electrolytes, and antidotes (e.g., reversal and rescue agents). The total number of reports was distributed evenly among the prescribing, dispensing, and administering nodes of the medication use system. High levels of frustration and tension among providers facing shortages that lack clearly defined or communicated management strategies are apparent from the reports. Organizations may use the data in this article and the revised Drug Shortage Assessment Checklist to inform proactive efforts, standardize protocols in drug shortage situations, prevent similar errors from occurring, and strengthen our national culture of safety.
- Copyright:
- Reproduced with permission of the copyright holder. Further use of the material is subject to CC BY-NC-ND license. (More information)
- Extent:
- 1 online resource (1 PDF file (13 pages))
- Illustrations:
- Illustrations
- NLM Unique ID:
- 101753796 (See catalog record)
- Permanent Link:
- http://resource.nlm.nih.gov/101753796