12 months ago the World Health Organisation launched its third Global Patient Safety Challenge: Medication Without Harm. The aim is to "reduce severe avoidable medication related harm globally by 50 per cent in the next five years".
In support of WHO's effort, the Department of Health and Social Care commissioned a review of the evidence base on medication errors in England to assess the extent and scale of medication error. They also established a Short Life Working Group (SLWG) to advise the Secretary of State on the scope of a programme of work to improve medication safety.
Medication is the second largest outgoing in the NHS after staff costs – around £16 billion for total annual drug expenditure (with £9 billion in primary care alone in 2016).
The SLWG report on reducing medication related harm was published on 23 February 2018.
Key recommendations include:
- Improved shared decision making so that patients and carers are encouraged to ask questions about their medications and health and care professionals actively support patients and carers in making decisions jointly, including when to stop medication.
- Professional regulators and leadership bodies should encourage reporting and learning from medication errors.
- Build on work to identify and increase awareness of “look alike sound alike” drugs and develop solutions to prevent these being introduced.
- Work with industry and the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency to produce more patient friendly packaging and labelling.
Jill Mason, Partner
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