American Journal of Public Health Research, 2017, Vol. 5, No. 2, 30-35 Available online at http://pubs.sciepub.com/ajphr/5/2/1 ©Science and Education Publishing DOI:10.12691/ajphr-5-2-1 Decreasing Unintended Medication Discrepancies in Medication Reconciliation through Simple Yet Effective Interventions Hassan Tahir 1,* , Nagadarshini Ramagiri Vinod 1 , Vistasp Daruwalla 2 , Muhammad Umair Malik 1 , Nikath Zeeshan 1 , Lavanya Vuppu 1 , Thomas Simunich 3 , Medha Joshi 1 1 Temple University, Conemaugh Memorial Hospital, Johnstown, PA, USA 2 Wyne State University, Detroit Medical Center, Detroit, MI, USA 3 Statistitician, Conemaugh Memorial Hospital *Corresponding author: hassantahir_01@hotmail.com Abstract Background: Medication reconciliation is the process of comparing a patient's medication orders to all of the medications that the patient has been taking. Unfortunately, medication errors are common in our health system accounting for significant proportion of patient harm. The main objective of our study was to explore the effect of self-designed intervention in improving the accuracy of patient current medication list in the outpatient settings. Methods: The study designed entailed collection of data from October 2013 to March 2014. The data collected in October (The pre-intervention) was compared to the post-intervention data in March 2014. Following interventions were performed: Education of residents, nurses and patients, frequent reminders to the residents to perform medication reconciliation, sending notifications to the residents who failed to perform medication reconciliation, reminding the patients get all refills at the time of appointment and reminding the patients to bring pill bottles at each appointment. The pre-intervention data was compared with the post-intervention data for different types of medication errors. Normality of the variables was pre assessed. Non-parametric analysis using Fisher’s exact test was performed for comparison of categorical variables. Conclusion: In conclusion, our intervention improved the accuracy of patient current medication list in the electronic records as accurate as possible. For clinics and hospitals, medication reconciliation can enhance delivery of high value cost conscious care to the patients by reducing medication errors. Keywords: medication reconciliation, medication error, patient harm Cite This Article: Hassan Tahir, Nagadarshini Ramagiri Vinod, Vistasp Daruwalla, Muhammad Umair Malik, Nikath Zeeshan, Lavanya Vuppu, Thomas Simunich, and Medha Joshi, “Decreasing Unintended Medication Discrepancies in Medication Reconciliation through Simple Yet Effective Interventions.” American Journal of Public Health Research, vol. 5, no. 2 (2017): 30-35. doi: 10.12691/ajphr-5-2-1. 1. Introduction Medical errors are often inevitable. Medical reconciliation is one of the processes where medical errors are frequently noted. Thomsen et al in a systematic review accrued evidence from twenty nine studies. The authors reported a median adverse drug event of 14.9% per 1000 person months. The preventable adverse drug event was 5.6% per 1000 person months [1]. Medication reconciliation is commonly described as the process of comparing the prescribed patient's medication list to the actual number of medications that the patient has been taking. Medication reconciliation activities have mainly scrutinized during times of admission, transition or immediately following hospital discharge. Different and independent member of the medical team including nurses, residents, pharmacy and the primary physician usually performs medical reconciliation. This allows identifying current medications in use, discrepancies in medications prescribed and utilized by the patient with prompt correction of the errors. Medical reconciliation involves rigorous checking and patient education to make sure the variances in medications and their unintended usage is monitored as these inaccuracies lead to increased readmissions and adverse drug side effects. Majority of the patients during their hospitalization are substantially reliant on the medical and ancillary team for addressing their medications. The sudden burden of managing their own medications and recovery at discharge with inadequate supervision and assistance leads to erroneous medication use. Such mismanagement and medication discrepancies are further exaggerated by factors like language barrier, severe illness, patient’s comprehension of his medication regimen and familial support in appropriately monitoring the regimen. The objective of this study was to retrospectively identify the medication discrepancies in discharged patients by review the medication reconciliation. After which a six months of intervention was performed during which included educating physician and patients about the