Medication reconciliation prevents harm
Unintentional changes to patients’ medicine regimens often happen during hospital admissions. These unintended changes can cause patient harm during a hospital stay or after discharge.
MATCHING UP the medicines that the patient should be prescribed with those that are actually prescribed is a process called medication reconciliation. This can help ensure continuity of care, and prevent harm by reducing the opportunity for medication errors.
Facts to motivate you to MATCH UP medicines
- Between 10%-67% of medication histories have at least one error.
- Up to one third of these errors have the potential to cause patient harm.
- More than 50% of medication errors occur at transitions of care.
- Patients with one or more medicines missing from their discharge information are 2.3 times more likely to be readmitted to hospital than those with correct information on discharge.
- 85% of discrepancies in medication treatment originate from poor medication history taking. These educational materials provide clinicians with information on the four steps of the medication reconciliation process, evidence to support its use and the importance of team work and communication among staff involved in the patient’s care.
MATCH UP Medicines Resources
