HHS has issued a draft "National Action Plan for Adverse Drug Event Prevention" to limit adverse drug events, including medication errors and overdoses, among others.
The action plan has two key goals:
1. Identify common, clinically significant, preventable and measurable adverse drug events.
2. Align federal health agency efforts to reduce patient harms from these specific ADEs nationally.
National efforts will initially focus on three ADE targets: anticoagulants, which can cause bleeding; diabetes agents, which can cause hypoglycemia; and opioids, which can cause accidental overdoses, oversedation and respiratory depression.
The draft action plan proposes four basic strategies to reduce patient harm from these ADEs:
1. Surveillance. Coordinate federal surveillance resources and data to assess the health burden and rates of ADEs.
2. Prevention. Share evidence-based prevention tools across federal agencies and non-federal healthcare providers and patients.
3. Incentives and oversight. Explore opportunities, including financial incentives and oversight authorities, to promote ADE prevention.
4. Research. Identify current knowledge gaps and future research needs for ADE prevention.
HHS will accept comments on the draft national action plan until Oct. 3.
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