The Effect of Electronic Prescribing on the Patterns of Reported Medication Errors Among Pediatric in-patients at Gertrude’s Children’s Hospital

Abstract

Background Medication errors occur in all settings and may lead to adverse drug events. They are a major cause of avoidable harm and injury across the world. In Kenya, there is a high burden of medication errors in pediatric wards. Electronic prescribing was introduced in Gertrude’s Children’s Hospital to reduce the frequency of medication errors. Objective To assess the effect of electronic prescribing on the patterns of reported medication errors among pediatric in-patients at Gertrude’s Children’s Hospital. Methods A pre-post study was conducted in the pediatric ward of Gertrude’s Children’s Hospital. Medication error reports submitted before introduction of electronic prescribing (January 2016 to December 2016) and after introduction of electronic prescribing (January 2019 and December 2019) were collected. The reported medication errors were obtained from Q-pulse and medication records linked to the reports were reviewed to obtain the full medication history, demographic traits and the diagnosis. Approval to conduct the study was obtained from the KNH- UoN Ethics and Research Committee as well as from the Gertrude’s Institutional Ethical Review Board. Data analysis was done using STATA version 13 and R version 4.3.1. Descriptive data analysis and segmented regression analysis were done. The Wilcoxon Rank-Sum test was used to compare data from 2016 and 2019.