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The main aim of Electronic Prescribing and Medicines Administration (EPMA) systems is to improve patient safety by reducing prescribing and administration errors that could result in medication errors and adverse drug events.
At its simplest level, E-Prescribing can be defined as "the utilisation of electronic systems to facilitate and enhance the communication of a prescription or medicine order, aiding the choice, administration and supply of a medicine through information and decision support and providing a robust audit trail for the entire medicines use process".
E-Prescribing has been identified by Connecting for Health as a core service for all Trusts in England and, in Scotland, the NHS is now considering a national approach to hospital e-prescribing and medicines administration.
EPMA also facilitates wider improvements in clinical practise: reductions in paperwork and transcriptions; improved audit trails for medication; performance monitoring and intelligence; reporting for PbR; greater consistency and continuity of care between primary and secondary care settings; and more enhanced communication between hospital departments and pharmacies.
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Typical EPMA process |
EPMA system functionality includes
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Capture of patient demographics, including:
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Information collected during admission, discharge, transfers and pre-admission
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Allergy information for clinical checking
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Height and weight
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Inpatient prescribing, including:
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Prescribing of individual drugs
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Protocol prescribing
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Changing the prescription
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Re-prescribing of previous treatments
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Clinical pharmacist verification
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Prescribing for outpatients
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Decision support using the Multilex Drug Data File provided by FirstDataBank Europe
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Nurse administration
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Discharge prescribing with discharge letter
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Short-term leave prescribing
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Formulary management
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Clinical notes
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Integration with pharmacy management system