Involving patients and providers to develop an Irish patient education tool on medication safety

Abstract

Abstract Let's Talk Medication Safety was developed to encourage members of the public to play a more active role in their medication management and to work in partnership with healthcare providers to reduce errors and improve safe practice. This paper discusses the processes undertaken to develop an effective patient education tool. Patients, the public and healthcare providers were involved in all stages of its development. The main areas of concern were established as: patients not knowing the basics of their medicine; the lack of knowledge about the interaction between medicines; and over and under-prescribing. Mistakes with medication are most likely to happen at the point of handover of care. As such, the information provided concentrated on the interface between hospital and community care. A pilot assessment of the booklet found that it tended to increase knowledge and influence behaviour in relation to medication safety. The study concludes that simple and direct educational material, which involves both service users and providers throughout the development process, seems to be effective.