ArticleBMC pediatrics2020
A study of medication errors during the prescription stage in the pediatric critical care services of a secondary-tertiary level public hospital.
Article in BMC pediatrics, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 18 citations in OpenAlex.
- Medication errors in emergency departments: a systematic review and meta-analysis of prevalence and severity.International journal of clinical pharmacy · 2024Pooled it
- Global Prevalence and Associated Factors of Medication Errors in Hospitalized Pediatric Patients: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.JMIR pediatrics and parenting · 2026Review
- Prevalence and types of medication errors among children under five (5) years in 3 primary health care facilities in the Western region of Ghana: a retrospective quantitative study.BMC primary care · 2025Article
- Role of clinical pharmacist in ensuring safe medication practices for pediatric cardiac care in low- and middle-income countries.Antimicrobial stewardship & healthcare epidemiology : ASHE · 2025Article
- Nurses' attitudes towards factors determining the safety of patients treated in pediatric departments.Frontiers in health services · 2025Article
- Exploring the Use of Persuasive System Design Principles to Enhance Medication Incident Reporting and Learning Systems: Scoping Reviews and Persuasive Design Assessment.JMIR human factors · 2024Article
- Determining Medication Errors in an Adult Intensive Care Unit.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2023Article
- Article
- Dosing Accuracy of Oral Extemporaneous Suspensions of Antibiotics: Measuring Procedures and Administration Devices.Pharmaceutics · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundMedication Errors (MEs) are considered the most common type of error in pediatric critical care services. Moreover, the ME rate in pediatric patients is up to three times higher than the rate for adults. Nevertheless, information in pediatric population is still limited, particularly in emergency/critical care practice. The purpose of this study was to describe and analyze MEs in the pediatric critical care services during the prescription stage in a Mexican secondary-tertiary level public hospital.
methodsA cross-sectional study to detect MEs was performed in all pediatric critical care services [pediatric emergency care (PEC), pediatric intensive care unit (PICU), neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), and neonatal intermediate care unit (NIMCU)] of a public teaching hospital. A pharmacist identified MEs by direct observation as the error detection method and MEs were classified according to the updated classification for medication errors by the Ruíz-Jarabo 2000 working group. Thereafter, these were subclassified in clinically relevant MEs.
resultsIn 2347 prescriptions from 301 patients from all critical care services, a total of 1252 potential MEs (72%) were identified, and of these 379 were considered as clinically relevant due to their potential harm. The area with the highest number of MEs was PICU (n = 867). The ME rate was > 50% in all pediatric critical care services and PICU had the highest ME/patient index (13.1). The most frequent MEs were use of abbreviations (50.9%) and wrong speed rate of administration (11.4%), and only 11.7% of the total drugs were considered as ideal medication orders.
conclusionClinically relevant medication errors can range from mild skin reactions to severe conditions that place the patient's life at risk. The role of pharmacists through the detection and timely intervention during the prescription and other stages of the medication use process can improve drug safety in pediatric critical care services.
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