‘Medicines reconciliation’ is the process of accurately listing a resident’s medicines.
Following several recent medication errors, please can home managers and clinical leads remind their staff about the importance of ‘medicines reconciliation’ when residents come into a care home.
- All care homes’ medication policy should include how to undertake medicines reconciliation.
- Medicines reconciliation is vital when a person is discharged from hospital or transferred from another setting/residence (including home), and when treatments/doses change.
- Medicines reconciliation must be undertaken by appropriately trained, competent, staff.
- The most up to date reliable source should be used. Any discrepancies must be recorded, and reason(s) established. If the information on a hospital discharge summary/medication labels/prescription request paperwork does not match, to seek clarification contact the hospital or community pharmacy (telephone no. on medication dispensing label). Where there is an urgent need to sort out issues identified, out-of-hours, contact NHS 111 for advice.
- Avoid use of any medication that is not labelled, including when there are no directions on how to take the medicine on the dispensing label- please contact the relevant pharmacy for advice.
- Minimise distractions when carrying out medicine’s reconciliation.
Click here for a good practice guide on medicines reconciliation which covers how to manage the process.
Click here for a recent webinar which discussed medicine reconciliation
For any further advice please contact the team via hweicbenh.pharmacycarehomes@nhs.net