Using a spare medication vial to store multiple medications: a potentially fatal in-home medication error.
Leonard JB, Klein-Schwartz W. Using a spare medication vial to store multiple medications: A potentially fatal in-home medication error. Ame J Health-syst Pharm. 2019;76(5):264-265. doi:10.1093/ajhp/zxy037.
Patient and family medication administration mistakes can result in medication errors at home. This commentary describes the problem of "pill dumping," where patients combine their daily medicines into a spare vial. However, patients are at risk for mistakenly taking a vial of a single medication instead of their pill-dump vial and inadvertently overdosing. The authors suggest medication counseling and use of daily pill boxes as tactics to prevent this type of error.