Development of a screening strategy for community-based adverse drug related events in the emergency department

Adverse Drug Related Events (ADREs) are the most common type of preventable non-surgical adverse event related to medical care, and represent a leading cause of death. Each year, in BC alone, Emergency Departments treat an estimated 130,000 patients for ADREs, most of which are caused by medications prescribed in community settings. Unfortunately, community-based programs aimed at detecting and reducing drug-related problems have not led to a significant decline in morbidity, mortality or health services utilization. Emergency Department practitioners are well situated to play a pivotal role in the timely recognition and treatment of community-based ADREs. Unfortunately, Emergency Physicians currently detect only 50% of ADREs, missing opportunities to intervene.

Adverse Drug Related Events (ADREs) are the most common type of preventable non-surgical adverse event related to medical care, and represent a leading cause of death. Each year, in BC alone, Emergency Departments treat an estimated 130,000 patients for ADREs, most of which are caused by medications prescribed in community settings. Unfortunately, community-based programs aimed at detecting and reducing drug-related problems have not led to a significant decline in morbidity, mortality or health services utilization. Emergency Department practitioners are well situated to play a pivotal role in the timely recognition and treatment of community-based ADREs. Unfortunately, Emergency Physicians currently detect only 50% of ADREs, missing opportunities to intervene.

The objective is to develop a rapid, user-friendly systematic screening strategy to optimize the detection and management of community-based ADREs which present to the Emergency Department. The project will develop an innovative, systematic screening algorithm that allows Emergency Department staff to identify patients at risk for community-based ADREs. Once validated, the algorithm can be rapidly implemented, using existing resources, in Emergency Departments and other practice settings across the country and will allow rational referral of high-risk patients to a medication expert. This will improve patient safety immediately by enabling early recognition and management of ADREs. In addition, by enabling systematic screening, this algorithm will facilitate high-quality data collection on community-based ADREs for future research. The ultimate goal is to reduce drug-related morbidity from community-based prescriptions.