Detecting medication errors in pharmacovigilance database:Capacities and limits

摘要

Background: Following the Institute of Medicine report on medication errors, pharmacovigilance activity is focusing more on patient safety. The aim of this study is to assess the ability to collect and identify Medication Errors "ME" from Adverse Drug Events "ADRs" reported to Pharmacovigilance Centre of Morocco.Methods: It is a retrospective analysis of ADEs reported to Pharmacovigilance Centre of Morocco from 2003 to 2006.Results: 1300 cases of ADEs were reported to the Moroccan Pharmacovigilance Centre of which 14.4% (n = 187) were considered as preventable. ME associated with preventable ADEs "pADEs" and related to the medication use system, occurred most often at the stage of prescribing (36.3%), and administration (34.8%). Regarding the type of ME, most of them were related to dose errors (49.3%) following by therapeutic and clinic monitoring errors (15.9%). Among the pADEs, 41.7% were serious and the outcome was favourable in 93%.Conclusion: Mutual cooperation between various source organizations is key for detecting ME and building an extensive database. The database will helps identify situations that are most prone to errors, and hence define preventive strategies. Thus, the quality of health care delivery is more likely to improve, thereby ensuring patient safety.