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Introduction: Prescription audit is a type of vigilance activity, which is beneficial in clinical practice in terms of reducing the burden of disease because of medication errors. The aim of the audit was to study the prescribing practices of the outpatient department of an ophthalmic tertiary care public sector hospital. The objectives were to assess the drug use pattern and to recommend suggestions, if any, to improve the prescribing practices. This was a prospective, cross-sectional descriptive study. Materials and Methods: A study was conducted over a period of 1 month (February) to audit the ophthalmic prescriptions received at free generic pharmacy of the tertiary hospital. Data was collected using a predetermined sample size (625) and random sampling strategy. Audit of prescriptions was done and WHO drug prescription and usage indicators were analyzed. Statistical Analysis Used: The data was analyzed using Microsoft Excel 2010 and Strata 11. Results: Out of randomly selected 625 prescriptions, patient identification details were not properly mentioned in 23% of prescriptions. Some errors were, missing name in 8 (1.28%), missing age in 68 (10.88%), and missing gender in 65 (10.4%) prescriptions. Regarding drug prescription indicators, the doses and correct strength of drug was mentioned in 7 (1.12%) prescriptions and the route of administration of drug was not written in 17 (2.72%) prescriptions. Out of the total 1543 drugs prescribed, only 134 (8.68%) drugs were prescribed in generic form. One hundred (6.48%) drugs were prescribed from the WHO Essential Drug Formulary (EDF), 115 (7.45%) drugs were prescribed from the National EDF, and a total of 129 (8.36%) drugs were prescribed in the form of fixed-drug combinations. An average of 2.47 ± 1.51 drugs were prescribed per patient. Polypharmacy was not significant as more than five drugs were prescribed in only 4% of prescriptions. Conclusions: Prescription writing errors were common which include incorrect mention of patient details, route of administration, and correct dose and strength of drugs. Awareness against polypharmacy was high. Efforts should be taken to promote the usage of generic form of drugs. Standardization of prescription writing and regular conduct of audits is the way forward.

Background: An audit is the examination and evaluation of health-care procedures and documents to compare the quality of care provided with accepted standards. The prescribing audit study is part of an audit that monitors, evaluates, and, if necessary, recommends changes in physicians' prescribing practices. Prescription validation is a quality improvement process that aims to improve patient care. Methodology: A prospective observational study was conducted in the outpatient department setting of the National Accreditation Board for Hospitals and Health-care Providers and Joint Commission International approved Super Speciality Hospitals of the Capital Territory of India. Data were collected randomly, 100 prescriptions across different department settings of Super Speciality Hospitals for 1 month in November 2022. Data were analyzed on the standard format of World Health Organization core prescribing indicators and in the form of mean and percentage. Results: A total of 17 parameters were accessed for the prescription audit. From the data, we can predict that in a total of (n = 100) samples of prescription audit, only 21.65% (368) cases had noncompliance, 67.59% (1149) cases had compliance, and 10.76% (183) did not apply to this parameters. Conclusion: According to this study, the compliance rate for prescription audit parameters is 67.59%, which should be improved by training staff regularly and holding large group meetings and internal audits. Small group meetings with experienced professionals of the organization can help in the constant maintenance of quality. It is also possible to automate the prescription creation process with software for at least the basic details. Finally, the study concludes this with the organization that needs to use its clinical pharmacy experts in the quality improvement process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clinical pharmacists are encouraged to participate in falls prevention programs in many healthcare facilities. A uniform methodology for the work of clinical pharmacist in fall prevention has not yet been established in the Czech Republic. The aim of this work is to offer the methodology based on our own data analysis. Retrospective clinical pharmacist's output analysis was performed in two areas: fall's pharmacoprevention and post-fall drug audits. In the results 78 % of patients who fell during hospitalization were over 65 years of age. Age was subsequently taken as the basic criterion for the patient's medication evaluation with regard to the risk of falling. Thanks to the widespread expansion of clinical pharmaceutical care and the newly introduced fall prevention and monitoring system at ÚVN Prague, there was a positive trend in the incidence of medication's adverse effects on patient's falls: in 2017 it was 34 % of cases, in 2020 only 13 %. Based on our data and experience, we offer a methodology for the clinical pharmacist's activity in fall prevention: 1. performing revision of medication also with regard to the risk of falls in patients over 65 years of age, 2. ensuring the automatic requests sending to the clinical pharmacy department in the case of a patient's fall in a medical facility.