Prescription Drug Dispensing Errors - How To Avoid Pharmacy/Pharmacist Mistakes

David Mittleman

Attorney
(866) 735-1102 Ext 430

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According to the Journal of The American Medical Association (JAMA) a report published 10 years ago, found that prescription drugs killed over 100,000 people in our country each year. That is 3 times as many as are killed by automobiles - making prescription drug death the 4^th leading killer after heart disease, cancer, and stroke.

In a more recent study, 50 pharmacies in 6 cities throughout the US were evaluated on their dispensing accuracy rate. The study found an overall accuracy rate of 98.3%. That’s 77 errors per 4,481 prescriptions. The authors of the study concluded that prescription dispensing mistakes occur at a rate of 4 errors per day in a pharmacy filling 250 prescriptions a day. If you do the math - with over 3 billion prescriptions being filled annually - there are over 50 million prescription errors.

How to reduce the Risk:

• Ask Questions (Doctor/Pharmacist)
• Take your time
• Check the name of the medication
• Check the dosage
• Check the directions
• Ask about drug interaction
• Ask about side effects
• Don't be in a hurry

If you or a loved one is a victim of pharmacy/pharmacits error that caused a serious injury, contact us to see if we can help.