Wrong medications prescribed or given in error and patient compliance are just some examples that lead to harm, let alone all those errors that slip through the net either by an error by the patient or by the healthcare worker.
http://www.pharmaceutical-journal.com/news-and-analysis/news/medication-errors-cost-the-nhs-up-to-25bn-a-year/20066893.article
Yes,as a patient I have made many errors with my medication. Forgetting to take them, taking them twice, taking the wrong tablet. But do they get reported?
As a healthcare worker, do I make errors or "Near misses" corrected before patient interaction commences?
There is now a rush to introduce Medication Software within the NHS which might help, but having designed & implemented clinical software I do wonder if this will significantly reduce medication errors. What is needed is technology to help with the routine mundane day to day checking of medications, the cross reference that patients & healthcare workers do every day.One way to achieve this is by using a Data-matrix or similar code on all medication boxes, ampoules to a national standard that all pharmaceutical companies use & then giving an app free to patients & healthcare workers to be able to check their meds (without the need to connect to the web). Yes you could tie it into your hospital Meds systems, GP systems & to patient prescriptions to make meds reconciliation a 2 minute process.
For more detail on how this works see: http://alharveyuk.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/simple-technology-for-ezdrugid.html