Academic Pediatrics
Volume 10, Issue 4 , Pages 233-237 , July 2010

Using Pharmacy Data to Screen for Look-Alike, Sound-Alike Substitution Errors in Pediatric Prescriptions

  • William T. Basco Jr., MD, MS

      Affiliations

    • Corresponding Author InformationAddress correspondence to William T. Basco, Jr, MD, MS, Division of General Pediatrics, Medical University of South Carolina, 135 Rutledge Avenue, MSC 561, Charleston, South Carolina 29425.
    • ,
  • Myla Ebeling
    • ,
  • Thomas C. Hulsey, MSPH, ScD
    • ,
  • Kit Simpson, DrPH

Received 16 September 2009 ,Accepted 27 April 2010.

References 

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  2. Lambert BL, Lin SJ, Chang KY, Gandhi SK. Similarity as a risk factor in drug-name confusion errors: the look-alike (orthographic) and sound-alike (phonetic) model. Med Care. 1999;37:1214–1225
  3. Lambert BL, Chang KY, Lin SJ. Effect of orthographic and phonological similarity on false recognition of drug names. Soc Sci Med. 2001;52:1843–1857
  4. Phatak HM, Cady PS, Heyneman CA, Culbertson VL. Retrospective detection of potential medication errors involving drugs with similar names. J Am Pharm Assoc (2003). 2005;45:616–621
  5. Bell DS, Cretin S, Marken RS, Landman AB. A conceptual framework for evaluating outpatient electronic prescribing systems based on their functional capabilities. J Am Med Inform Assoc. 2004;11:60–70
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  9. US Pharmacopeia. US Pharmacopeia 8th Annual MEDMARX Report indicates look-alike/sound-alike drugs lead to thousands of medication errors nationwide. Available at: http://vocuspr.vocus.com/vocuspr30/Newsroom/ViewAttachment.aspx?SiteName=uspharm&Entity=PRAsset&AttachmentType=F&EntityID=105435&AttachmentID=6b770787-571e-4dc1-ba3b-eb21d7bac147. Accessed February 16, 2010
  10. Institute for Safe Medication Practices. ISMP's list of confused drug names. Available at: http://www.ismp.org/Tools/confuseddrugnames.pdf. Accessed February 16, 2010.
  11. Phatak HM, Cady PS, Heyneman CA, Culbertson VL. Utilization of the Idaho Medicaid Claims Database to analyze potential look-alike/sound-alike medication errors. J Am Pharm Assoc. 2001;41:324
  12. Pittard WB, Laditka JN, Laditka SB. Associations between maternal age and infant health outcomes among Medicaid-insured infants in South Carolina: mediating effects of socioeconomic factors. Pediatrics. 2008;122:e100–e106
  13. Kaushal R, Jaggi T, Walsh K, et al. Pediatric medication errors: what do we know? What gaps remain?. Ambul Pediatr. 2004;4:73–81
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  15. Kaushal R, Bates DW, Abramson EL, et al. Unit-based clinical pharmacists' prevention of serious medication errors in pediatric inpatients. Am J Health Syst Pharm. 2008;65:1254–1260
  16. Wang JK, Herzog NS, Kaushal R, et al. Prevention of pediatric medication errors by hospital pharmacists and the potential benefit of computerized physician order entry. Pediatrics. 2007;119:e77–e85
  17. Malone DC, Abarca J, Skrepnek GH, et al. Pharmacist workload and pharmacy characteristics associated with the dispensing of potentially clinically important drug-drug interactions. Med Care. 2007;45:456–462
  18. Keating T. CMS releases final rule on e-prescribing. Agency hopes to improve patient safety, cut costs. Nephrol News Issues. 2008;22:16–17
  19. Filik R, Purdy K, Gale A, Gerrett D. Drug name confusion: evaluating the effectiveness of capital (“Tall Man”) letters using eye movement data. Soc Sci Med. 2004;59:2597–2601
  20. Nott MR. Misidentification, in-filling and confirmation bias. Anaesthesia. 2001;56:917

PII: S1876-2859(10)00113-0

doi: 10.1016/j.acap.2010.04.024

Academic Pediatrics
Volume 10, Issue 4 , Pages 233-237 , July 2010

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