Electronic Health Records and E-Prescribing

Electronic Health Records and E-Prescribing Electronic Health Records and e-prescribe Use of EHRs to reduce medication errors Electronic health records (EHRs) can help reduce medication errors that result in high costs as a result of recalls and fines. EHRs can be used to pass important information regarding the medication being recalled. Through the EHRs, it is possible to contact all patients who were given the recalled medication and advise them accordingly whether to dispose of the medication or to change the dosage.

For drugs that have been recalled because of some tablets being oversized such as Hydrocodone Bitartrate and Acetaminophen Tablets U.S. Food and Drug Administration, 2012b () , the patients could be advised to make sure they take only the drugs that are of standard size while for drugs that have packaging flaws such as Propofol which was recalled because of glass vial defect U.S. Food and Drug Administration, 2012a () , the patients could be advised to return to the nearest health center for exchange.

The patients could also be advised on the remedial actions for taking drugs that are recalled such as antidotes. In this way, EHRs would be advantageous in passing information to patients regarding the recalled drugs. EHRs can also be used to reduce medication errors by preventing patients from being given drugs which have been recalled. The system would automatically notify the physician that the drug has been recalled thus they need to prescribe an alternative drug.

At the pharmacy, the pharmacists will also be notified of drug recalls thus keeping them updated on which drugs have been recalled and if the recalls only affect certain lots or batches, the pharmacist will be able to tell if they have any drugs in the recalled lot or batch and these will not be given out to patients.

EHRs will also help to ease the process of drug recalls since the manufacturer will be able to know which pharmacy has the drug or particular lot or batch that has been recalled. This will save the time for collection of these drugs considerably. Patients will also be able to return the recalled medication to their nearest pharmacy which will then return the recalled drugs to the manufacturer thus increasing the efficiency of the recall process.

Safety checks that an EHR's e-prescribing feature can perform EHRs can help to perform important safety checks for physicians when prescribing drugs. EHRs can alter the physician about any medical errors that may impact patient outcomes. A good example is that the EHR will keep record of all medications and allergies that the patient has and when the physician is prescribing drugs for the patient, it automatically checks to ensure the medication being prescribed does not contain any of the items that the patient is allergic to.

In so doing, the EHR alerts the physician of any potential conflicts thus requiring the physician to prescribe an alternative drug. For drugs that have been recalled due to health risks or other issues, the EHR will also alert the physician of any problems that the drug may cause thus also requiring the physician to prescribe an alternative drug Sidorov, 2006() EHR systems also prevent physicians from overdosing, under-dosing or giving their patients the incorrect medication for their diagnosis.

Since the EHR system collects all relevant information about the patient such as laboratory tests conducted and results and other tests such as X-ray, MRI, etc., the system prevents physicians from giving patients the incorrect medication for the diagnosis Pagliari, Don, & Singleton, 2007() Electronic health record systems can help in the quick and systematic identification of operational issues and adverse effects from a certain drug.

For example when the system notices that there is a pattern of adverse effects or safety issues that occur as a result of exposure to or usage of a certain drug, the physician will be notified thus enabling them to find out if the adverse effects are as a result of exposure to.