Reducing medication errors based on auto-ID technologies in hospitals

Abstract

It is well known that preventable medication errors occur in hospitals. The effects of medication errors are so harmful that preventing them is crucial to patient safety. The final stage in which medication errors can happen is the medication administration stage at the bedside of patients. In order to enhance patient safety associated with the medication administration, auto-ID technologies such as barrode and RFID can be utilized in hospitals. In this paper, we review and compare the applicability and appropriateness of barrode and RFID technologies in healthcare settings. A barrode medication administration (BGMA) system for reducing medication errors is presented, which can be used as a reference model for implementing similar systems. The system arrhitecture and major data flows of the BOMA system are described in detail. Also, an operation scenario and implementation results of the developed system are addressed. It has been proved that possible medication administration errors can be detected and prevented with its assistance. © 2011 ISSN.