Computerized Physician Order Entry System on the

Aim To assess the impact of the implementation of a Computerized Physician Order Entry (CPOE) associated with a pharmaceutical checking of medication orders on medication errors in the 3 stages of drug management (i.e. prescription, dispensing and administration) in an orthopaedic surgery unit. Methods A before-after observational study was conducted in the 66-bed orthopaedic surgery unit of a teaching hospital (700 beds) in Paris France. Direct disguised observation was used to detect errors in prescription, dispensing and administration of drugs, before and after the introduction of computerized prescriptions. Compliance between dispensing and adminis-tration on the one hand and the medical prescription on the other hand was studied. The fre-quencies and types of errors in prescribing, dispensing and administration were investigated. Result