Pharmacists are frequently involved in medication reviews for hospitalized patients prescribed direct oral anti-coagulants (DOAC). This randomized controlled study explored pharmacist involvement with patients prescribed DOAC in ambulatory care. The intervention included up to three phone calls, electronic health record communication with the prescriber, and recommendations for lab work. After 90 days, there were no differences in clinically important medication errors between groups.

Transitioning from hospital to nursing home (NH) can be a vulnerable time for patients. This study looked for potential associations between adverse events (AE) for NH residents following hospital discharge and NH facility characteristics (e.g., 5-star quality rating, ownership, bed size). Researchers found few associations with individual quality indicators and no association between the 5-star quality rating or composite quality score. Future research to reduce AEs during transition from hospital to NH should look beyond currently available quality measures.

High-risk medications have the potential to cause serious patient harm if not administered correctly. In this randomized trial, a pharmacist-directed intervention (including in-home assessment by a clinical pharmacist, communication with the primary care team, and telephone follow-up) did not result in a lower rate of adverse drug events or medication errors involving high-risk drug classes during the posthospitalization period.

This study randomized primary care practices across ten health care systems to evaluate the effectiveness of a multifactorial intervention to prevent falls with injury, which included risk assessment and individualized plans administered by specially trained nurses. The intervention did not result in a significantly lower rate of serious fall injury compared to usual care.

Transitions from hospitals to long-term care facilities are associated with safety hazards. This prospective cohort study identified adverse events in the 45 days following acute hospitalization among 555 nursing home residents, which included 762 discharges during the study period. Investigators found that adverse events occurred after approximately half of discharges. Common adverse events included falls, pressure ulcers, health care–associated infections, and adverse drug events. Most adverse events were deemed preventable or ameliorable. The authors conclude that improved communication and coordination between discharging hospitals and receiving long term-care facilities are urgently needed to address this patient safety gap. A previous WebM&M commentary discussed challenges of nursing home care that may contribute to adverse events.

Electronic health record alerts contribute to alert fatigue and increase provider workload. Some alerts are more time-sensitive than others and a delayed response can adversely impact patient safety. This study found that time-sensitive alerts were less likely to be opened by primary care providers within 24 hours if the provider's InBasket had a high number of notifications at the time of alert delivery or if the alert was sent on the weekend.

Inappropriate antibiotic use contributes to microbial resistance for the recipient and the community. This study found increased harms related to antibiotic use among older patients living in nursing homes with higher antibiotic use compared to nursing homes with overall lower antibiotic use. These findings demonstrate the need to manage antibiotics effectively to improve the safety of all nursing home residents.

This study established that unintentional medication discontinuation upon nursing home admission decreased over time, though this improvement could not be attributed to accreditation requirements for medication reconciliation or any other specific intervention. This study highlights the challenge of attributing safety improvements to specific policy or practice changes.

Preventing hospital readmissions has been a major health system priority for several years. Although recent data indicates that readmissions in adult patients are decreasing slightly, the approaches individual hospitals or health systems should use to prevent readmissions remain unclear. This randomized controlled trial evaluated the effect of a postdischarge virtual ward where patients received postdischarge care from a multidisciplinary team that met daily to review the patient's progress, conduct home visits, arrange home services, and coordinate care with the patient's primary physicians. Patients were admitted to the virtual ward for a mean of 35 days after discharge and received 3 home visits on average during that time. Despite the intensity of the intervention, there was no effect on 30-day readmissions or any other clinical outcome compared to usual postdischarge care. Another recent randomized trial found that a similarly intensive intervention did not reduce readmissions in a vulnerable elderly patient population. The authors of this study note that difficulty in communicating with primary care physicians, exacerbated by the lack of an integrated electronic medical record, may have contributed to the failure of the virtual ward at preventing readmissions.

Clinical pharmacists retrospectively reviewed ambulatory records to identify adverse drug events following hospital discharge among patients aged 65 years and older. As in prior studies, frequent adverse drug events were found involving a wide range of medications, not limited to potentially inappropriate medications as defined by Beers criteria.

Dementia appeared to be an independent risk factor for medication errors among a cohort of geriatric nursing home patients who were prescribed the anticoagulant warfarin. Increased nursing staff time seemed to mitigate this risk.

This article comments on the patient safety implications of drug shortages and a proposed approach to guide clinical decision-making when distributing medications during shortages.

This study reports on the initial findings of a novel survey intended to evaluate safety culture in nursing homes, the Survey on Resident Safety in Nursing Homes.

This commentary suggests strategies for improving prescribing safety, including linking pharmacy and laboratory data through health information technology.

Warfarin therapy is commonly associated with adverse events despite specific indicators designed to capture them and guide prevention efforts. This study adopted the SBAR communication tool as part of a protocol to improve the quality of warfarin management in the nursing home setting. Using a facilitated telephone communication between nurses and physicians in 26 nursing homes, the patients randomized to the SBAR approach had statistically significant improvements in their therapeutic levels and a non-statistically significant reduction in adverse events. A past AHRQ WebM&M commentary discusses a case of inadequate warfarin monitoring that resulted in an adverse event for a nursing home patient.

This study reports on the development of standards for laboratory monitoring of high-risk medications (such as anticoagulants) in ambulatory care. Pilot testing revealed that the developed guidelines were not being consistently followed, with infrequently prescribed medications most likely to be monitored inappropriately.

Prior studies have documented suboptimal safety culture in long-term care facilities. This AHRQ-funded study used surveys and interviews to examine one specific aspect of safety culture—communication between nurses and physicians. Nurses noted several problems with communication, including lack of receptiveness by physicians and difficulty reaching physicians. Many nurses noted instances of unprofessional or disruptive behavior by physicians. Nurses acknowledged the need to use structured communication protocols as a means of improving communication. Patient harm can result from a physician's failure to acknowledge a nurse's concerns about patients, as illustrated in this AHRQ WebM&M commentary.

This study discovered that clinical decision support built within a CPOE system can improve physician prescribing behavior in long-term care settings.

Medication administration in long-term care facilities is a lengthy process, and the large number of interruptions nurses experience during the process may lead to errors.