Conference article

The purpose of Shared Medication (SMR) is to ensure medication reconciliation and thereby reduce the medication errors, thus increasing patient safety. However, medication errors concerning high-risk drugs as Warfarin remain a well-known issue in transitions of care. We examine if different ways of prescribing Warfarin in SMR affect patient safety in regards to transitions of care. We conducted a literature research and semi-structured interviews to investigate the objective. Data were analyzed based on the three analytical questions, and findings were synthesized. The findings indicate that implementing SMR has resulted in new errors. The medical order entry system allows for different manners to prescribe Warfarin which complicates reuse of information in primary sector. This can potentially jeopardize patient safety. Challenges using SMR in relation to the prescription of Warfarin creates workarounds which prevents a number of potential medication errors. But workarounds induce the risk of new undiscovered medication errors, which is why we argue for a higher degree of standardization in medication reconciliation of high risk drugs as Warfarin.

Patient Safety, Medication Reconciliation, Medication Systems, Hospital, Medication Systems, Medication Errors, Medical Order Entry Systems, Shared Medication Record