Introduction
Pharmacy primarily entails gathering, preparation, and standardization of different types of medicines; hence, at all times practitioners in this field must be ready to dispense all types of drugs that have been prescribed by doctors. To achieve this, the pharmacist must have updated records of a patient’s medical history, as it is their responsibility to formulate, store, and give correct drugs, which in most cases are in form of premeasured tablets and capsules.
Executing all these duties in most community pharmacies sometimes can be a very daunting task, considering the huge numbers of members that community members must serve, as they are also not exempted from doing procurement, storage, dispensing, and recording of all drugs that have been given out to patients. Although this has been the case for a while, the introduction of prescribing innovations such as E-prescribing has revolutionized the entire system, because it has reduced the volumes of paperwork that these practitioners are supposed to do.
Electronic prescribing primarily entails the sharing of prescription information between computers that are on a network, among prescribers, medical practitioners, and clients. This methodology requires no paperwork; hence, it provides a mechanism of linking healthcare providers with their clients and drug dispensing community pharmacies at the same time. This networked system will have all information that pertains to patients including their medical history, any drugs that they have received throughout their sickness, and any cancelations or changes that were made, in terms of the drugs that patients have been receiving (Spiro and Webster 35-42).
Considering this, E-prescribing has not only improved the efficiency in dispensing drugs but also has improved the levels of safety involved in the process of prescribing and giving out drugs to patients, because the system contains all data that pertains to a patient’s drug history.
Benefits of E-prescribing
When using the E-prescribing method all that doctors are required to do is to enter drug prescriptions in a computer that should be in their offices, after which this information is relayed to the pharmacy computer; hence, all that is required of pharmacists is just to check the drug history of the patient, dispensing of the specified medicines, and giving patients the required advice on their progress.
One primary advantage of this method is that, in addition to making the transfer of information very easy between doctors and pharmacists, this method provides an interlinked channel between different pharmacies; hence, individuals are not forced to attend specific community pharmacies with their medical pharmacies but they can get their drugs from any pharmacy that is a member of this like network. As a result of these, this prescribing method has few associated errors as compared to those that are associated with the numerous numbers of errors in prescriptions that are likely to occur (Spiro and Webster 39-41).
To pharmacists, this method has increased the level of safety and the overall quality of healthcare, because not only is this method legible, but also, it is has a security warning alert and provides an easy way of accessing all the patient’s data. In terms of legibility, this method has reduced the number of errors that are associated with hand-written prescriptions, which in the past have made community pharmacists face higher liability costs, in case of errors.
In addition to this, this method is more secure, because any time the system detects a prescription error, it will give a warning signal that must be responded to. This is possible because this method has a medication management system that uses different review programs to link any entered patient data with the drugs prescribed; hence, limits cases such as dispensing of drugs that may cause allergic reactions to individuals or drugs that a patient’s immune system has rejected (Therapeutic Research Centre 2-3).
Additionally, this method can improve the level of work output, because of the minimal number of calls and call-backs, follow-up calls, and pre-filing of charts, which in normal dispensing scenarios wastes a lot of time. Further, this prescribing mechanism has high levels of patient compliance, because the computers have all information about patients; hence, there are no prescription orders that may go unfilled. As a result of this, this method can improve formulary adherence, provide a method of knowing the required notification follow-ups on clients, and can enhance patient convenience, because it requires individual s to visit pharmacies only once.
On the other hand, this method has streamlined the refill request process, because instead of patient’s visiting specific community pharmacies, all they require is to supply their identification details to a provider, who will turn enter the data into the system and do any refills that are required depending on the information that is stored in the networked system. Moreover executing most refill requests has been made easy by this method, as this method provides a real-time communication methodology between different individuals, enables query reporting (a feature that was lacking in paper prescriptions, and it is less costly (it has reduced labor, supplies, and chart maintenance costs) (Therapeutic Research Centre 3, and Florida Agency for Healthcare Administration 1).
To patients, this method has numerous benefits, because it is fast, convenient, secure, legible, and economical. Under this method, all that is required is one to enter the required patient’s identification information; hence, less paperwork is required. In addition, considering that any prescriptions are received by the dispensing community pharmacy in real-time, the method is faster and provides a mechanism of attending to more needs of patients.
This method is convenient in the sense that, one is not required to visit a pharmacy to drop off their prescription, but rather this can be done via a safe network. On the other hand, this method is more legible, because misinterpretations of any hand-written information are avoided since everything is done electronically. Lastly, this method is economical in the sense that, it enables doctors to ascertain the type of medicine that a patient’s medical insurance funds can afford to pay for; hence, patients using this method will always receive the best services (Pennell 1).
Conclusion
In conclusion, E-prescribing is one of the most important innovations in pharmacy, because it has revolutionized the drug prescribing and dispensing process in community pharmacies. Such is the case primarily because, it has reduced paperwork, and it is faster, more convenient, secure, and legible not only to the pharmacist but also to both doctors and patients. All that is required in this method is just to have access to a computer and be on the drug prescribing network.
Works Cited
Florida Agency for Healthcare Administration. Advantages of E-prescribing. Florida Health Information Network. 2009. Web.
Pennell, Ursula. What is E-prescribing and what are the benefits. 2009. Web.
Spiro, Rachelle, and Webster, Lisa. Healthy information technology: a new world of Technology. Pharmacy Today16.2 (2010): 32-44. Web.
Therapeutic Research Center. New developments for Electronic prescribing. Pharmacist Letter/ Prescribed Letter 23. 230301 (2007): 1-5. Web.