Unsafe medication practices are leading causes of harm
Assistant Minister of Health and Wellness, Setlhomo Lelatisitswe has urged Batswana to not only desist from taking drugs without prescription but to take personal responsibility for managing their take-home medication.
“When you are prescribed medicine, it is yours alone and it’s not meant to be shared with the whole family,” he stressed, adding that, “medication harm can result in severe patient harm, disability, and even death.
Giving a speech during the launch of World Patient Safety Day in Thamaga, Lelatisitswe explained that the day was set aside by the World Health Assembly in May 2019 to encourage and empower patients, their caregivers, and healthcare professionals to take an “active role in ensuring safer medicine practices and medication use processes including prescription, preparation, dispensing, administration and monitoring”.
World Patient Safety Day is an annual event celebrated on the 17th of September established by the 72nd World Health Assembly in May 2019, with the adoption of Resolution
WHA72.6 on ‘Global action on patient safety’. The resolution recognises patient safety as a global health priority whose origin is firmly grounded in the fundamental principle of medicine of: ‘First do no harm’, setting the tone that no one should be harmed in the process of delivering care.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) states that unsafe medication practices and errors are the leading causes of avoidable harm. Errors occur when weak medication systems are in place combined with human factors such as fatigue and poor environmental or staff conditions.
“Some of the safety risks emanate due to incorrect storage, prescribing, dispensing, and administration. These account for at least 50 percent of the total preventable harm in medical care,” Lelatisitswe stated.
Lelatisitswe noted that the theme ‘Medication Without Harm’ was relevant as everyone is affected in one way or another by medication use. “We have all received in recent past some kind of medication, preventative or curative including traditional medicine and in some cases cosmetics. It is therefore important to ensure that all these types of medication are safe to have and to use,” he said.