Tehran, Iran, June 14
By A. Shirazi - Trend:
The poor handwriting of doctors is responsible for the deaths of 3,000 Iranians each year, a senior official with Iran Pharmacists Association said.
“According to the latest statistics and research, preventable medication mistakes injure 45,000 Iranians annually,” Ali Fatemi said, Young Journalists Club (YJC) reported on June 14.
The report added that many such errors result from unclear abbreviations, dosage indications and illegible writing of millions of prescriptions in the Islamic Republic every year.
To address the problem, Iranian authorities need to move toward e-prescribing. This method could eliminate many of the errors that occur when pharmacists misunderstand or misrecord medication names or dosages conveyed messily on paper or by phone in a hurry.
Wider adoption of e-prescribing could lead to further efficiency in medical record keeping, which many believe is vital to both improving health care delivery and lowering costs.