Study of Safety Evaluation in Dispensing of Medicines-Analysis of Relationship between Dispensing Error Rate, Inspecting Error Rate, and Malpractice Rate.

In this study, we established a methodology to calculate the rate of overlooking a dispensing error (inspecting error rate) as a new index for the purpose of determining dispensing error and malpractice rates. Using data obtained from analyses of these error rates at our and two other hospitals, an inspecting error rate was calculated for each institution. Our results showed that inspecting errors occurred at a frequency 3-5 times greater as compared to dispensing errors at each of the examined hospitals. We concluded that construction of a higher quality safety management system would be enabled by incorporation of an inspecting error rate as a new index to evaluate medical safety in regard to dispensing of medicines and managing inspection accuracy.