Pocono News Section

Medication Reconciliation

Medication Reconciliation - Wednesday, April 23, 2008 at 7:12PM EST

Reported by: Eric Scheiner
Wednesday, Apr 23, 2008 @ 07:12pm EST
WILKES-BARRE -- The Institute of Medicine claims up to 98,000 deaths in hospitals each year are due to medical errors, many of them involving prescription medication.

Geisinger Medical and Health centers are working on their "medication reconciliation" program to help prevent accidental adverse reactions to drugs.

Part of the program is to convey the message to patients that is important for them and their family members to know what medications they are on, as well as the dosage when they go in for treatment. This information is vital to caregivers.

The "medication reconciliation" program also puts some additional responsibility on health care providers, insurers, nurses and doctors in terms of double checking and instituting new electronic file sharing programs to help improve care.

WYOU Interactive discusses the program with Dr. Susan Paolucci, Ruth Nolan, and Kendric Maynor from Geisinger Health Systems.