Profile of prescribing errors detected by clinical pharmacists in paediatric hospitals in Spain.

Background: Pharmaceutical care involves three essential functions: identifying potential and real medication-related problems, solving real medication-related problems and preventing potential medication related problems.

Objective: To describe the profile of prescribing errors detected and prevented by paediatric clinical pharmacists in medical orders for inpatients in Spain.

Settings And Methods: A prospective, descriptive, multicentre epidemiological study on medical orders for inpatients aged 1 day to 18 years, conducted between July and October 2011 at eight hospitals treating paediatric patients.

Two-round Delphi technique for the consensual design of a paediatric pharmaceutical care model.

The main goal of clinical pharmacists is to improve patient care quality by providing individualised care. This is achieved by validating prescriptions and performing pharmacotherapeutic follow-up, leading to effective, safe and efficient drug therapy. However, there is no specific model for medication order validation in paediatrics addressing the distinct issues of paediatric drug use or the greater susceptibility of medication errors occurring in this patient group.