Medication Use Process: 4 simple steps

Doctors: Prescribe

Assess need, select drug and regimen

Before: ask patients for DI (Drug interactions), DA (allergies) and CI (contraindications) as well as ensure appropriate drug.
DA: "u got any allergy or not?"
DI: "u got take any medicines before this??" + review drug history.
CI: review medical history.

Consider alternative therapies (but most docs don't do that... i wonder why.)

During: Check name, drug name, dose, quantity, frequency, route of admin. Write clearly.

After: watch out for any unprecented reactions, follow-up, review your drug booklets regularly

Pharmacists: Dispense

Before: check prescription for legality, ambiguity, correct drug --> correct illness and nice handwriting. Refuse if not met.
Make sure u key in the correct drug order to the correct patient profile. (Otherwise hong gan)
If the computer got say DA, DI, CI, etc, check for them and see if Doctor got miss out.
Refuse if so.
Type label: Make sure drug name, dose, frequency (instructions), quantity, name of patient, date, date of expiry, hospital/pharmacy name, serial no., other instructions blah blah blah all that the doctor writes in the Rx are all there. Paste your secondary labels also.
Paste correct label to correct drug container. (Otherwise hong gan, redo)
Before dispensing, CHECK correct drug with prescription, NOT label.

During: Ask the patient's name / NRIC / 11B / whatever.
Ask if patient has any DA. Inform prescriber if any
Check if patient is taking any medications, like TCM. May cause DI
Tell patient of drug, how to take it, and any adverse drug reactions (ADR). Ask patient to pay.
"OK this is carbamazepine, 200mg/tablet, the doctor already tell you to take 2 tabs in the morning and 3 tabs at night. May cause drowsiness. That will be $200"

Nurses: Administer

Take the correct medication chart for the correct patient.
Examine the prescription carefully, make sure everything is understood.
Make sure the doctor/pharmacist reviews a drug if it is being used for the first time.
Check for DA (usually nurses dun give a damn though. maybe chief nurses)
Check for 5 rights:
right drug
right dose
right route (of administration)
right patient
right time

Whack the medicine into the person... encourage them to express any discomfort or problems experienced during the administration (SCREAM!!!)

(Usually little children cry like hell, so for injections one way is to distract them with a sweet then ask their parents to hold them down.. then whack)

Inform the patient what the drug is used for (usually they don't), any adverse drug reactions, and tell them to report any ADR.

Record the drug into the patient's medication chart.