Slide Presentation of the 2007 Annual Meeting of AHRQ

The Safety Problem: Flowchart

Flowchart describing the factors involved in patients not receiving adequate medication education before leaving the hospital.

Factors include:

Health Care Team

• Staffing shortages
• Inconsistent knowledge of resources

Resources

• Inconsistent availability of teaching tools
• Generic teaching documentation forms

Methods

• Patient education left to day of discharge
• Little collaboration among disciplines
• Variability in the degree/amount of education

Patient

• Hard to predict LOS
• High patient acuity and number of medications
• High census and patient turnover