title: Comparison of intensive care unit medication errors reported to the United States' MedMarx and the United Kingdom's National Reporting and Learning System: a cross-sectional study.
abstract: The objective was to compare the characteristics of medication errors reported to 2 national error reporting systems by conducting a cross-sectional analysis of errors reported from adult intensive care units to the UK National Reporting and Learning System and the US MedMarx system. Outcome measures were error types, severity of patient harm, stage of medication process, and involved medications. The authors analyzed 2837 UK error reports and 56 368 US reports. Differences were observed between UK and US errors for wrong dose (44% vs 29%), omitted dose (8.6% vs 27%), and stage of medication process (prescribing: 14% vs 49%; administration: 71% vs 42%). Moderate/severe harm or death was reported in 4.9% of UK versus 3.4% of US errors. Gentamicin was cited in 7.4% of the UK versus 0.7% of the US reports (odds ratio = 9.25). There were differences in the types of errors reported and the medications most often involved. These differences warrant further examination.
authors: 1University of Michigan School of Medicine, Ann Arbor, MI.
authors: Joyce A
authors: JA
authors: Wahr
authors: Andrew D
authors: AD
authors: Shore
authors: Lindsay H
authors: LH
authors: Harris
authors: Philippa
authors: P
authors: Rogers
authors: Sukhmeet
authors: S
authors: Panesar
authors: Linda
authors: L
authors: Matthew
authors: Peter J
authors: PJ
authors: Pronovost
authors: Kevin
authors: K
authors: Cleary
authors: Julius C
authors: JC
authors: Pham
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D006801:Humans; D007362:Intensive Care Units / Q000592:standards / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008508:Medication Errors / Q000009:adverse effects / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012308:Risk Management / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006113:United Kingdom / Q000453:epidemiology; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology
keywords: critical care; hospital incident reporting; medication errors; risk management