The legibility of prescription medication labelling in Canada: Moving from pharmacy-centred to patient-centred labels.
BACKGROUND
The legibility of medication labelling is a concern for all Canadians, because poor or illegible labelling may lead to miscommunication of medication information and poor patient outcomes. There are currently few guidelines and no regulations regarding print standards on medication labels. This study analyzed sample prescription labels from Ontario, Canada, and compared them with print legibility guidelines (both generic and specific to medication labels).


METHODS
Cluster sampling was used to randomly select a total of 45 pharmacies in the tri-cities of Kitchener, Waterloo and Cambridge. Pharmacies were asked to supply a regular label with a hypothetical prescription. The print characteristics of patient-critical information were compared against the recommendations for prescription labels by pharmaceutical and health organizations and for print accessibility by nongovernmental organizations.


RESULTS
More than 90% of labels followed the guidelines for font style, contrast, print colour and nonglossy paper. However, only 44% of the medication instructions met the minimum guideline of 12-point print size, and none of the drug or patient names met this standard. Only 5% of the labels were judged to make the best use of space, and 51% used left alignment. None of the instructions were in sentence case, as is recommended.


CONCLUSIONS
We found discrepancies between guidelines and current labels in print size, justification, spacing and methods of emphasis.


CONCLUSIONS
Improvements in pharmacy labelling are possible without moving to new technologies or changing the size of labels and would be expected to enhance patient outcomes.
School of Optometry and Vision Science (Leat, Krishnamoorthy), University of Waterloo, Waterloo.
Susan J
SJ
Leat
School of Optometry and Vision Science (Leat, Krishnamoorthy), University of Waterloo, Waterloo.
Kristina
K
Ahrens
School of Optometry and Vision Science (Leat, Krishnamoorthy), University of Waterloo, Waterloo.
Abinaya
A
Krishnamoorthy
School of Optometry and Vision Science (Leat, Krishnamoorthy), University of Waterloo, Waterloo.
Deborah
D
Gold
School of Optometry and Vision Science (Leat, Krishnamoorthy), University of Waterloo, Waterloo.
Carlos H
CH
Rojas-Fernandez