Carers' Medication Administration Errors in the Domiciliary Setting: A Systematic Review.

<h4>Purpose</h4>Medications are mostly taken in patients' own homes, increasingly administered by carers, yet studies of medication safety have been largely conducted in the hospital setting. We aimed to review studies of how carers cause and/or prevent medication administration err...

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Main Authors: Anam Parand, Sara Garfield, Charles Vincent, Bryony Dean Franklin
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Public Library of Science (PLoS) 2016-01-01
Series:PLoS ONE
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0167204
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author Anam Parand
Sara Garfield
Charles Vincent
Bryony Dean Franklin
author_facet Anam Parand
Sara Garfield
Charles Vincent
Bryony Dean Franklin
author_sort Anam Parand
collection DOAJ
description <h4>Purpose</h4>Medications are mostly taken in patients' own homes, increasingly administered by carers, yet studies of medication safety have been largely conducted in the hospital setting. We aimed to review studies of how carers cause and/or prevent medication administration errors (MAEs) within the patient's home; to identify types, prevalence and causes of these MAEs and any interventions to prevent them.<h4>Methods</h4>A narrative systematic review of literature published between 1 Jan 1946 and 23 Sep 2013 was carried out across the databases EMBASE, MEDLINE, PSYCHINFO, COCHRANE and CINAHL. Empirical studies were included where carers were responsible for preventing/causing MAEs in the home and standardised tools used for data extraction and quality assessment.<h4>Results</h4>Thirty-six papers met the criteria for narrative review, 33 of which included parents caring for children, two predominantly comprised adult children and spouses caring for older parents/partners, and one focused on paid carers mostly looking after older adults. The carer administration error rate ranged from 1.9 to 33% of medications administered and from 12 to 92.7% of carers administering medication. These included dosage errors, omitted administration, wrong medication and wrong time or route of administration. Contributory factors included individual carer factors (e.g. carer age), environmental factors (e.g. storage), medication factors (e.g. number of medicines), prescription communication factors (e.g. comprehensibility of instructions), psychosocial factors (e.g. carer-to-carer communication), and care-recipient factors (e.g. recipient age). The few interventions effective in preventing MAEs involved carer training and tailored equipment.<h4>Conclusion</h4>This review shows that home medication administration errors made by carers are a potentially serious patient safety issue. Carers made similar errors to those made by professionals in other contexts and a wide variety of contributory factors were identified. The home care setting should be a priority for the development of patient safety interventions.
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spelling doaj-art-2764ce8f9a834eb48f5ebc04da370bf52025-08-20T03:29:17ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS ONE1932-62032016-01-011112e016720410.1371/journal.pone.0167204Carers' Medication Administration Errors in the Domiciliary Setting: A Systematic Review.Anam ParandSara GarfieldCharles VincentBryony Dean Franklin<h4>Purpose</h4>Medications are mostly taken in patients' own homes, increasingly administered by carers, yet studies of medication safety have been largely conducted in the hospital setting. We aimed to review studies of how carers cause and/or prevent medication administration errors (MAEs) within the patient's home; to identify types, prevalence and causes of these MAEs and any interventions to prevent them.<h4>Methods</h4>A narrative systematic review of literature published between 1 Jan 1946 and 23 Sep 2013 was carried out across the databases EMBASE, MEDLINE, PSYCHINFO, COCHRANE and CINAHL. Empirical studies were included where carers were responsible for preventing/causing MAEs in the home and standardised tools used for data extraction and quality assessment.<h4>Results</h4>Thirty-six papers met the criteria for narrative review, 33 of which included parents caring for children, two predominantly comprised adult children and spouses caring for older parents/partners, and one focused on paid carers mostly looking after older adults. The carer administration error rate ranged from 1.9 to 33% of medications administered and from 12 to 92.7% of carers administering medication. These included dosage errors, omitted administration, wrong medication and wrong time or route of administration. Contributory factors included individual carer factors (e.g. carer age), environmental factors (e.g. storage), medication factors (e.g. number of medicines), prescription communication factors (e.g. comprehensibility of instructions), psychosocial factors (e.g. carer-to-carer communication), and care-recipient factors (e.g. recipient age). The few interventions effective in preventing MAEs involved carer training and tailored equipment.<h4>Conclusion</h4>This review shows that home medication administration errors made by carers are a potentially serious patient safety issue. Carers made similar errors to those made by professionals in other contexts and a wide variety of contributory factors were identified. The home care setting should be a priority for the development of patient safety interventions.https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0167204
spellingShingle Anam Parand
Sara Garfield
Charles Vincent
Bryony Dean Franklin
Carers' Medication Administration Errors in the Domiciliary Setting: A Systematic Review.
PLoS ONE
title Carers' Medication Administration Errors in the Domiciliary Setting: A Systematic Review.
title_full Carers' Medication Administration Errors in the Domiciliary Setting: A Systematic Review.
title_fullStr Carers' Medication Administration Errors in the Domiciliary Setting: A Systematic Review.
title_full_unstemmed Carers' Medication Administration Errors in the Domiciliary Setting: A Systematic Review.
title_short Carers' Medication Administration Errors in the Domiciliary Setting: A Systematic Review.
title_sort carers medication administration errors in the domiciliary setting a systematic review
url https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0167204
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