ArticlePharmacy practice2012
Clinical pharmacist evaluation of medication inappropriateness in the emergency department of a teaching hospital in Malta.
Article in Pharmacy practice, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 4 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed.
- Identifying and Resolving Drug-Related Problems in Geriatric Patients.Hospital pharmacy · 2026Review
- Development and validation of a deprescribing tool relevant to older persons in India using modified Delphi consensus technique.BMC geriatrics · 2025Article
- Prescription of potentially inappropriate medication to older patients presenting to the emergency department: a nationally representative population study.Scientific reports · 2018Article
- Erratum to: Clinical pharmacist evaluation of medication inappropriateness in the emergency department of a teaching hospital in Malta.Pharmacy practiceArticle
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
unlabelledAppropriate prescribing remains an important priority in all medical areas of practice.
objectiveThe objective of this study was to apply a Medication Appropriateness Index (MAI) to identify issues of inappropriate prescribing amongst patients admitted from the Emergency Department (ED).
methodsThis study was carried out at Malta's general hospital on 125 patients following a two-week pilot period on 10 patients. Patients aged 18 years and over and on medication therapy were included. Medication treatment for inappropriateness was assessed by using the MAI. Under-prescribing was also screened for.
resultsTreatment charts of 125 patients, including 697 medications, were assessed using a MAI. Overall, 115 (92%) patients had one or more medications with one or more MAI criteria rated as inappropriate, giving a total of 384 (55.1%) medications prescribed inappropriately. The mean SD MAI score per drug was 1.78 (SD=2.19). The most common medication classes with appropriateness problems were biguanides (100%), anti-arrhythmics (100%) and anti-platelets (96.8%). The most common problems involved incorrect directions (26%) and incorrect dosages (18.5%). There were 36 omitted medications with untreated indications.
conclusionsThere is considerable inappropriate prescribing which could have significant negative effects regarding patient care.
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