'Standardizing medication labels: confusing patients less, workshop summary' (2008)

Summary

Medications are an important component of health care, but each year their misuse results in over a million adverse drug events that lead to office and emergency room visits as well as hospitalisations and, in some cases, death. As a patient's most tangible source of information about what drug has been prescribed and how that drug is to be taken, the label on a container of prescription medication is a crucial line of defence against such medication safety problems, yet almost half of all patients misunderstand label instructions about how to take their medicines.

This book, 'Standardizing Medication Labels: Confusing Patients Less', is the summary of a workshop, held in Washington, D.C. on 12 October 2007. It was organised to examine what is known about how medication container labelling affects patient safety and to discuss approaches to addressing identified problems.