Tuberculosis and associated factors among type 2 diabetic patients in Perak: a case control study

This is a case-control study conducted with diabetic patients in Kinta, Kampar and Larut-Matang-Selama districts of Perak, Malaysia. We intended to determine the factors contributing to the development of active tuberculosis among diabetes patients. Cases were culture-proven and registered in the Malaysian National Tuberculosis Surveillance Registry (MyTB) from 2012 to 2018. Controls were diabetes patients identified from the National Diabetes Registry and were matched with cases based on the clinic in which they were registered at a ratio of 1:1. 119 cases and 119 controls were included in this study. Multivariate analysis was used to identify clinical factors associated with tuberculosis. Patient had increased odds of having tuberculosis if they had higher glycaemic (HbA1c) levels (OR=1.41, 95% CI 0.22-0.96, p<0.001) or nephropathy (OR=8.91, 95% CI 2.31-34.05, p<0.001). The odds ratio was lower if they have diabetes for at or more than 5 years (OR=0.46, 95% CI 0.22-0.96, p=0.04) and older (OR=0.96, CI 0.92-0.99, p=0.02). In conclusion, this study suggests that routine screening for tuberculosis in patients with diabetes should consider the diabetic duration, glycemic control, presence of nephropathy, and age of the patient

Effectiveness of a pharmacist-led quality improvement program to reduce medication errors during hospital discharge

Background: Patients requiring medications during discharge are at risk of discharge medication errors that potentially cause readmission due to medication-related events. Objective: The objective of this study was to develop interventions to reduce percentage of patients with one or more medication errors during discharge. Methods: A pharmacist-led quality improvement (QI) program over 6 months was conducted in medical wards at a tertiary public hospital. Percentage of patients discharge with one or more medication errors was reviewed in the pre-intervention and four main improvements were developed: increase the ratio of pharmacist to patient, prioritize discharge prescription order within office hours, complete discharge medication reconciliation by ward pharmacist, set up a Centralized Discharge Medication Pre-packing Unit. Percentage of patients with one or more medication errors in both pre- and post-intervention phase were monitored using process control chart. Results: With the implementation of the QI program, the percentage of patients with one or more medication errors during discharge that were corrected by pharmacists significantly increased from 77.6% to 95.9% (p<0.001). Percentage of patients with one or more clinically significant error was similar in both pre and post-QI with an average of 24.8%. Conclusions: Increasing ratio of pharmacist to patient to complete discharge medication reconciliation during discharge significantly recorded a reduction in the percentage of patients with one or more medication errors

Additional file 2 of The impact of a prescription review and prescriber feedback system on prescribing practices in primary care clinics: a cluster randomised trial

League tables (bar charts displaying the percentage of prescribing errors for the health districts, health clinics, and of individual prescribers) (DOCX 226 kb)

Additional file 3 of The impact of a prescription review and prescriber feedback system on prescribing practices in primary care clinics: a cluster randomised trial

Authorised feedback letter (a letter signed by the state health director showing individual prescribing error rate and prescribing performance based on a performance rating scale) (DOCX 15 kb)

Additional file 1 of The impact of a prescription review and prescriber feedback system on prescribing practices in primary care clinics: a cluster randomised trial

Prescribing Error Record Form (a standardised data collection form to record prescribing errors identified during the structured prescription review process) (DOCX 20 kb)