Marc Sweeney, R.Ph., M.Div., Pharm.D., is co-principal investigator for the project.

Medication errors are surprisingly common and costly, which makes patient safety a growing area of concern for the health care industry. The topic has been under the microscope at the federal level due to the continually rising cost of health care.

UF’s School of Pharmacy recently became involved in a project that includes research into how physicians and pharmacists can work together to reduce medication errors. Marc Sweeney, R.Ph., M.Div., Pharm.D., UF’s chair and associate professor of pharmacy practice, is part of a team that was awarded a $133,619 grant to research the topic.

The Ohio Medical Quality Foundation approved the grant for a project titled “Partners in Technology to Improve Patient Safety - Phase III” to Ohio University, College of Osteopathic Medicine in partnership with The University of Findlay's School of Pharmacy, the Ohio Pharmacists Association and the Ohio Osteopathic Association. The grant money primarily will be used to purchase and install electronic prescribing (e-script) software at study sites, pay travel expenses for team members, and pay stipends for data analysis and collection by faculty and student assistants.

As co-principal investigator, Sweeney will work with other experts in the area, including co-principal investigator, Martha Simpson, D.O., M.B.A., from Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine, to evaluate the role of technology as it relates to patient safety and look at the effectiveness of electronic prescribing of medications. Other UF faculty and students also will participate in the project by helping with data collection and analysis.

According to Sweeney, students will be chosen to help with the project based on the extent of pharmacy practice and interest in patient safety.

Beginning in January, physicians’ offices and pharmacies in Athens, Ohio, will voluntarily participate in the study. The research team hopes that electronic prescribing will eliminate common problems with handwritten prescriptions, such as legibility issues with bad handwriting and unclear faxes and decreased productivity from phone calls to and from pharmacies receiving the prescriptions.

Another benefit of electronic prescribing is that the software used for the program screens a patient’s drug history before the patient, and the prescription, even leave the physician’s office. The software checks the patient’s medical record to make sure that the new prescription will not interfere with other medications taken by the patient. Once the prescription has been reviewed and no problems are found, the prescription is electronically sent to the pharmacy chosen by the patient where the medication should be ready when the patient arrives.

Phase I of the program began in 2002. Team members spent one 12-month period gathering information to find out what elements of an e-script software package are most important to physicians and pharmacists. During Phase II, the team members studied the way electronic prescribing impacted the physicians who volunteered to participate in the study.

At the conclusion of Phase III, the study team has hypothesized that, among other positive outcomes, electronic prescribing will improve patient satisfaction and increase patient confidence.